Mind Gardens
by antisaints
Summary: Shisui is a problem solver. Itachi is a problem. And according to Shisui, any problem that starts with sex can be solved with sex. ShiIta. AU. Brain Damage spinoff.
1. Prologue

_**Mind Gardens**__  
Prologue_

The first thing Shisui remembered about _anything_ was how terrible Seoul used to smell. Since the Green movement became mainstream, the city had cleaned up immensely, but he still wouldn't go. Unlike the rest of the Uchihas, he hadn't been born in Japan, and unlike Mikoto's family, he didn't get the luxury of moving until after Su Moon died. But of all insignificant things Shisui remembered from his young age, it was the death smell of South Korea's capital. The way a room smells when you know an animal defecated there, but it's dark and you can't see. Or the way a piece of food looks when there's something on it, something that _might_ be mold, but you're so unbearably, unfathomably hungry that it makes you crazy with need. Then you eat it, and the idea that you might have eaten fungus and bacteria disgusts you so thoroughly that inevitably, the food spills out of your system a few minutes later.

Seoul smelled like dead animals. Like hospitals. Watercolor paint. Expired medicine.

He lived out in the suburbs, in a house too nice for his mother's unemployed lifestyle and his own expensive school tuition, but they were Uchihas, and that meant whatever they want, they got. It was an unfair lifestyle. Even at the shy age of eleven years old, Shisui knew that. He'd _assumed_ that, before his father left, his mother had worked for most of her life and earned her money. But apparently something was special about her, because twice a month, she received checks with Japanese postage. And once a month, for the past eleven years of his life, she would receive a call from her half-sister. That was, of course, until very recently. Something happened in Japan, and suddenly, they were making trips to Seoul. All the time. Sick, epidermal-rot Seoul whose air could only make him think of the word _bacteria_ and _contagion_.

Shisui wasn't a germaphobe. Quite the opposite, he was a rather messy child, and came home most days from school with paint and dirt smeared on his pretty face. But he was hypersensitive to smells, and even as Seoul began to clean itself up, that first horrid scent never left his memory, and forever would he associate that first wave of nausea with the city's name.

He was there when Mikoto's family had touched down. Auntie, uncle, seven year old cousin, three year old cousin. Shisui had been excused from his private school for the affair, his haircut _quite_ ridiculous because Su Moon loved his hair long and wouldn't take him to get it cut himself. After some children made fun of him for his hairstyle, Shisui had hacked most of it off with a pair of left-handed scissors that he could _barely _maneuver because he was in fact _not_ left handed. He'd gone from looking like a darling little girl to a darling little girl whose hair alone seemed to have intercepted a weed whacker, but after realizing that the children in question were going to make fun of him either way (and _oh_, how he'd been teased for the disaster on top of his head) he'd stopped caring what other children thought of him entirely.

That was, of course, until he was forced to meet his Aunt's family.

--

The day that seven-year-old Uchiha Itachi emerged onto the tarmac at Incheon International Airport was swelteringly, disgustingly hot. It was already twilight, sun resting its tired head on the horizon, but the humidity was in the ninetieth percentile and it weighed like a heavy cotton blanket across his face, so that even his breath felt too hot as it slipped from his lips. His mother's perfume, fragrant and cool, was immediately smothered simply by the smell of the heat, the steam from the asphalt and the rubber of the wheels of the plane. It called a dampness to his skin and made him sore.

They walked in through air so thick that it felt as if they were swimming. Itachi was not a fan of swimming, and he was even less a fan of sweating, and so approximately thirty six seconds into his arrival on Korean soil, he had decided that his first impression was that he did not like it at all, least of all the weather.

His mother, who was dressed in a beautiful pink dress that swayed around her like an array of petals and a beige cardigan that made her look frighteningly young, led his baby brother along by his small, sticky hand, and his father walked along and tried to look as proper as usual, which really just made him look stuffy and irritated.

The airport had a modern, minimalist look to it, all echoing tile and sharp-edged tile and chrome, and it was immensely congested, people seeming to scramble about in hot, sweaty tangles. Itachi looked only forward and stopped when his mother stopped, in front of a small, modest looking family to hug a woman he had never met with an almost suspicious enthusiasm.

"_Jamae!_" This was the first Korean word Itachi ever heard, and it came in a strange cry from the woman before him, her narrow arms wrapping around his mother's waste and a strange smile to match her company's. "_Seobangnim_..!" The second word, addressed at his stoic father, who hadn't slept at all in days and thus the total of his response was a short nod. Her eyes flitted over Itachi, then Sasuke, a strange flatness in her expression as she smiled, and Sasuke flinched visibly, squeezing Itachi's hand and making an inarticulate sound. At three, Sasuke could convey compound and complex sentences with increasing comfort, and his vocabulary was growing steadily, but when faced with things he could not understand, tended to regress within himself.

Shisui stared.

Itachi stared back.

Then he gathered Sasuke a bit closer to him, one small, sharp hand on the back of his small head, dark eyes leveled on his cousin's face, and he did not take them off of it for a long while, until his mother began to guide him towards the family car with the family chauffeur waiting alongside it.

It seemed like a strange, youthful accusation. As if he were to blame for the heat. And for Korea as a whole.

--

Itachi made up a _futon_ like an elderly woman. His corners were boxed and military, as if he had been long employed by a hospice, and he seemed to have the empathetic capabilities of a brick, or a wood chipper. He did not look around the house or even at his cousin, whose room he and Sasuke were to share. They were staying over, Shisui's mother's half-sister's family (that was to say the Main Family; _the_ Main Family) until the boxes were moved into their house which was not too far away. Shisui's mother's half-sister, which was to say his aunt, was fantastically beautiful and agreeable woman, and she was chattering sweetly like a bird in the other room. And Sasuke, who'd stayed awake during the entire flight (which, admittedly, wasn't very long, but he was three and didn't often exert himself to such a degree), promptly took great pleasure in exploring every crevice of their temporary home despite his paralyzing fear of speaking to its typical occupants, then ate a cookie, which gave him a temporary, babbling sugar high before a very powerful crash that had him asleep in a futon prepared by his mother only 45 minutes after they'd settled.

Shisui was quiet but watchful, sitting on his bed with his back against the wall and his eyes placid. The kind of placid that, if seen on an adult, one would suspect the person in question might be under the influence of something illicit, but on a child? Dismissed as daydreaming. Which was his favorite thing to do. He was a dreamy, blurry child, the kind that would sing in the hallways and run in place in the shower, and there was a sticky _pop_! of a noise as he pulled a cherry lollipop from between his lips, speaking in even but accented Japanese:

"What is your name?"

Itachi stiffened, shoulders flattening from where they had previously been slightly hunched and back straightening. He had damnably good posture, which was also the sort of things adults noticed differently than children. He looked like some bird straightening its wings. Other than that, however, he did not acknowledge that he had spoken at all. He had no desire to speak, very less to Shisui, and so he pretended that he had not heard him. Itachi was rather inexperienced in pretending -- it did not especially agree with him, since it always went against his naturally honest disposition. He was honest. An honest, brutal child possessed of a passionate, soaring intelligence that made it almost impossible to interact with children his own age. Rather, he was asocial and awkward, in a cold, graceful sort of way.

He found himself thinking, rather, about the mechanics of masticating a lollipop, and he allowed his thoughts to move fluidly into the further mechanics of digestion. He imagined the undulations of his esophagus and the glands that processed his saliva.

Shisui frowned. "Hey, I'm speaking to you."

Itachi managed not to flinch. He did not appreciate being brought out of his thoughts.

"Please stop," he said, sounding greatly depreciating.

The older of the two leaned off his bed and, without missing a beat whatsoever, flicked him in the forehead. "No. Tell me your name or I'll babble at you in Korean for the next four hours."

"Please do not touch me," Itachi said, balking sharply away from his fingers.

Shisui blinked. It was like a bell had gone off in the back of his mind, and he grinned, that strange grin he and his mother shared as he leaned towards him, far enough off to stumble and hurt himself if he were as graceless as the average eleven-year-old, but he wasn't. Close enough to kiss him, should he have felt the impulse, but he hadn't. Not then, anyway. He was still sick from that godawful, sickly smell of Seoul, sick of the way it clung furiously to his skin and to the skin of his company's, trapping the ill will of it in the small containment of his well-kept bedroom, and he paused for a moment, eyes moving to the red mark on the boy's forehead where his fingers had been.

"One day. I'm going to make you my wife "


	2. Chapter 1

_**Mind Gardens  
**__Chapter One_

Itachi's parents were not going to let him live at Uni. That much, Shisui assumed, was a given. Mikoto could really only do so much as long as she was overseeing all of them and the business too, and Fugaku was a difficult, spiteful traditionalist.

Shisui had no parents. Rather, he had a dead mother and a father who was nowhere to be found, and Shisui would not have found him if given the opportunity and a trillion dollar incentive which, according to the majority of people he had polled over drinks, was the fundamental equivalent. This fact was directly correlated to the fact that Shisui _was_ living at Uni, and with an irritating roommate besides.

So the end quandary ended up being whose place it was going to be.

Neither option was incredibly enticing.

Uni meant University. University meant Todai. Tokyo daigaku. University of Tokyo. Home to over 30,000 students at any given time, spread over five campuses in Hongou, Komaba, Kashiwa, Shirokane and Nakano. All sub-wards of Tokyo. Home to Uchiha Shisui, towering by comparison to most of his fellow students at 6'0" even and nearly underweight at 142 pounds, who roomed with a mousy boy named Takani or Takeshi or _something_ of that nature in the secondmost expensive dorm money could buy. (The _most_ expensive dorm was a single occupancy apartment, but each had been filled with upperclassmen and International students, much to Shisui's disgust.) And the people that had taken him in, Uchihas themselves who'd never been able to conceive, were positively _delighted_ when Shisui said he was _finally_ ready to go to school, for they had simply been _so_ upset at the concept of him not going at all.

When he'd finished High School, after he'd set record scores on his college entrance examinations (scores to be broken by his much younger cousin only two years later) - Shisui had told them he was going abroad, and that he would be back in six months. Six months became eight months. Became a year. Became eighteen months. Became two years before he finally flew back with an air of permanence, despite his frequent visitations for Holidays and the like - _just_ in time for his _darling_ little cousin of fifteen to score higher on the standardized test than anyone ever had. Ever would.

He'd brushed it off as coincidence.

Yet _despite_ his greatest efforts for their University studies to correlate, Itachi was not moving to a dorm. So Shisui was made to take a comprehensive personality test so they could match him with a roommate who would best suit him. And apparently, out of the 30,000 students at the University of Tokyo, the best they could come up with was Takani-Takeshi. Barely five feet, horribly shy and extremely easy to startle. Appeared to have _no_ personality because, on the day he moved in to their comfortable but _shared_ (Shisui didn't do particularly well with people he didn't like. Dislike became hatred _rather_ quickly) - apartment space, Takani-Takeshi put up no posters. Unpacked no CD towers. Had a game collection that was so inappropriately bland and well divided. Didn't demand Shisui follow any rules, nor did he designate anything as his own. But on the same front, never _stated_ that what was his was Shisui's.

He just spent most of his time at his desk, on his computer.

Shisui didn't like him at all. Because he was _not_ Itachi.

Itachi, as it were, was proving quite irritating in his own right, not that Shisui adored him any less for it. He had always been beguiling and elusive but University seemed to give him all sorts of opportunity and incentive to be even moreso. Lord knew who had approved him to do the maximum permitted credits (the rumor mill had already pegged him as the inevitable recipient of the President's Award, something Shisui had no doubt would last through each year of his attendance), but he had already officially selected his undergraduate major (Philosophy and Religion at the Faculty of Letters), which was (a) completely unprecedented, being that there was a mandated two year period allotted to each student in the name of General Education requirements (from which Itachi was exempt thanks to his weighted 5.0 average, his extensive cram schooling, and various stints in exclusive summer-time ventures into the realms of higher education), and (b) meant that the majority of his courses were on the Hongo campus.

Shisui's classes, however, were well spread and highly random. He was a man of many interests and little direction, humorous and relatively popular despite his low patience level, and he was always quick to challenge the professors if he knew they were wrong. In other words, he was a Class A: Smartass. The kind of student that every professor either _vehemently_ disliked or wouldn't mind sleeping with, and it was just Shisui's bad luck that every single one of his professors this semester were men. After all, not everybody was as Slightly-Gay as he was. "Slightly-Gay," he'd explained to one of his classmates, who'd arched a brow at the term, "is when you know one person of your gender you would bed. But, generally speaking, wouldn't bed anyone else of your gender. Also known as (insert object of desire's name)sexual."

Slightly-Gay somehow justified the strangeness of him. Justified that he was _pretty_, the way all Uchihas are, how he had a head of curly hair that hit his shoulders that looked like _chick-hair_. Justified how when he got angry, all the outer-beauty of him seemed to vanish in an instantaneous burst that confused and startled anyone who was dumb enough to agitate him. Justified that he would take Abstract Algebra, Values and the Modern World, Korean VIII, Competitive Swimming, Painting I, and Acting for Non-Acting Majors all in his freshman first semester, collectively scattered over three different campuses, and none of them working toward his major.

Shisui was, predictably, Undecided. But he was only taking math because he had to, philosophy to have argument with Itachi that scared their underachieving peers into dead silence, Korean VIII just because he wanted to take a class that sounded like a monarch, swimming because - when a problem comes along - the appropriate response is to put on a speedo and jump in a pool, painting because art majors were hot, and of course, acting. The only one that _actually_ made any sense. Shisui was a very good actor, an even better smooth-talker, and a _fantastic_ liar. And he had not shown up to class even once.

This had both nothing and everything to do with Itachi. On one hand, the class was taught by a notorious lecher whose company Shisui found borderline insufferable. On the other hand, the class was taught at a time that coincided with Itachi's Oral Communications lecture, a spectacle which Shisui had not missed one minute of thus far, and which he enjoyed immensely. Itachi - who was marvelously conservative both in styles of dress and in habits of speech - was quite the accomplished and efficient orator (and wasn't that just his way), and Shisui was loathe to miss an opportunity to see him speak, him with his sweet, pale face and his thick, rimless glasses and his cruelly black eyes.

Not that Itachi knew he went. Shisui was very careful of this. He consciously mapped out the part of the room situated in Itachi's blind spot and stayed there.

When he wasn't in any of his classes, or doing the minimal amount of cram studying necessary to still be able to set the curve in the classroom's grading scale (despite his questionable work ethic, Shisui was an indisputable genius. Not as smart as Itachi, of course, but who was?) - Shisui tended to visit Itachi at home. Because, regardless of how good Itachi was at avoiding him at school, the fact was, they were best friends. Always had been, always would be. And wherever Itachi was, Shisui had a tendency to simply show up there, just as he had before he graduated High School. There were only a number of exceptionally ritzy areas in Tokyo, and since the Uchihas tended to never want to settle for anything less than the _best_, many of said neighborhoods would have four or five different Uchiha units on one street. And, growing up, Shisui's had been two doors down from Itachi's.

Convenient?

Certainly so. It was the only thing he felt any amount of appreciation towards his foster family for. So when Shisui came around, he merely said that he was visiting his parents and simply wanted to check on his lovely Auntie Mikoto, oh-how-much-prettier-you-get-every-day , his sweet baby cousin Sasuke, who was spending more and more time locked in his room at the ripe age of 11 years old, and of course, as an _afterthought_, studious little Itachi. Obviously. Shisui _obviously_ wasn't coming home every weekend to see his cousin that he had a weird, Slightly-Gay crush on. Not at _all_. After all, that would be incestuous. Unnatural. And Slightly-Gay.

And, after all, Fugaku was already rather...perhaps "unfond" of him would be the right way to word it. He didn't hate him, heavens no - hate was reserved for those who did not share in his prestigious bloodline - but he certainly didn't like him, and he _certainly_ didn't like him loitering about his house, contaminating Itachi's work ethic with his aimlessness and his otiosity.

As if any person in the world could. contaminate Itachi's work ethic. A herculean effort in futility that would be.

"Ita_chiiii_, let me in. It doesn't take longer than five minutes to get decent."

It apparently did. And, for that matter, some time more. The door slid open about twelve minutes past five minutes.

"...apologies," he said, not looking particularly apologetic. He made no excuse for himself whatsoever.

Shisui sighed, giving him a flat look as he dropped his bookbag near the entrance of his baby cousin's bedroom. The _nice_ thing about having all of his courses spread out was that Shisui was all over Tokyo at all times. It meant that he quickly adjusted to constantly being on the move, meant that he had friends in every part of the city, and meant that going to Itachi's home was no longer considered an _ordeal_. On the other hand, it also meant that he spent hours of his precious life every day on the subway, time that could be better spent, oh. Watching dramas. Sleeping. Jerking off. Things essential to survival as a University student, at any rate. But regardless, Shisui liked it in Itachi's home. When they lived in Korea, they'd lived close. When Itachi's family moved back and Shisui's foster family had insisted they follow along, they'd continued to live close, by coincidence or perhaps by design. He glanced at Itachi's desk, snorting a little at the open textbook, the exposed pages filled with very neat little notes and perfectly horizontal highlights and underlines.

"Advanced Brain Chemistry?" He sighed dismissively, flopping on his cousin's bed like he owned it. "You're such a nerd, Itachi-kun. It's making you wrinkle prematurely."

Itachi looked down his nose at him severely, the contacts in his eyes catching the light so that they looked round and filmy around the edges of his irises. His glasses were sitting on his desk beside the book, but the nose-guard had left shallow indentations in the skin along the bridge of his nose, and now that he'd removed them, they were flushing slightly, and it was a bit cute. He was dressed well, shirt buttoned all the way up to his slim, long neck, and his hair was swept back, tied so that it hung low, near his nape.

"I am not wrinkling."

Shisui grinned, rolling onto his stomach and cracking his neck with a roll of his shoulders. No, he wasn't wrinkling. He was annoyingly man-pretty, the way he'd always been, the way they both were, and the way Sasuke - from the looks of it - was on his way to becoming. "Ho, yes you are~ At this rate, cara mia, you're going to look like an Armenian fishwife. Which would be strange because Armenia is completely landlocked. But not _too_ strange because there is always Lake Sevan. But I digress." He rubbed his cheek into Itachi's pillow, massaging his temple. This was one of Shisui's strengths. He could babble on like a ditzy child because people knew how to handle that. Itachi, of course, Itachi knew him better than that. Knew that when Shisui spoke in nonsensical rambles, he was indirectly mocking _him_ in some latent way, but they never argued about it. Not once. In fact, the grand total of Shisui and Itachi's arguments would be a single digit, and most of them would have occurred in their first year of knowing one another.

Itachi said nothing because he did not need to, which was a more common occurrence than one might think. He did not necessarily like talking at all, and he especially did not like talking when there was nothing worth saying, which, he deigned, was the majority of the time. He turned from him dismissively and reached to close the book by the cover; the light was coming in from the windows, which were very rarely open, and caught him at a magnificent angle, silhouetting the effeminate, doll-like features of his face and his long, feathery lashes. He moved with a careful, practiced ease over to the bookshelf, removing one of its members to toss it at him. It landed with a soft _fwump_ directly beside his face, perfectly flat. He did not tell him that it was his history book, or that it was from one of the only classes they shared, or that he had left it there for Itachi to collect.

The notes inside were missing, though.

"Do you have a girlfriend, Itachikun~?"

The question wasn't really as out of the blue as one might have assumed; Shisui asked from time to time, always receiving some version of the same answer, playing off the illusion that if Itachi _had_ a girlfriend, Shisui would somehow _not_ know about it. The only way he couldn't of would be if he'd dated anyone during Shisui's extensive stay overseas, and Shisui highly doubted that. Those years were spent studying for college entrance work, etcetera, etcetera. Itachi was a nerd. Itachi contemplated the meaning of life and solved abstract math equations when he was bored. His idea of a party was eating Dango and reading Confucian writings, or coming up with number puzzles for Shisui to solve. Although they certainly _acted_ wildly different, they really weren't. The only difference in their chemistry that kept Shisui from essentially being Itachi's Korean clone was that Shisui had this thing called

(impulse)

and it made him do stupid things. Great things, certainly. But stupid ones. Itachi was brooding and silent, choosing to trap his innate genius within himself and preferring contemplating over action. Shisui was brooding, but _vocal_. Not loud, but vocal. And he firmly believed that zeal left a much deeper footprint than understanding ever could, and really, that was why he was there. He was on a mission with all the fervor and cruel irony of an hyper-patriotic soldier. He let his eyes run over the book in front of his face, and grinned. Itachi, meanwhile, surveyed him from the opposite side of the room, seeming to weigh whether or not his question was worth answering.

"No," he said finally, in a tone that said he would rather not discuss it further. He offered no explanation.

Shisui gave him a sideways glance. "But certainly there are prospectives?"

"No," Itachi said, firmly dismissive. He gave him a look that distinctly said he disliked this current line of questioning.

The older of the two pretended to frown contemplatively, resting his chin in his hand and running a lock of hair back behind his ear. "Maa, Itachikun. That's not healthy. Fine, I'll simplify it, what's your _type_. I know you have one, everyone does." And if Itachi actually didn't, he needed to probably get his blood tested for hormone suppressants. The kid was _sixteen_. Even if he was lying, which was certainly a possibility, Shisui had never seen him with anyone. Which was exactly with how many people he _should_ have been with. He was marked with a fierce, albeit liberal possessiveness, and Itachi was almost an extension him. Always had been, always would be. Shisui had been Itachi's only friend until middle school, and Hoshigaki Kisame had undergone so many tests disguised as friendly theme park excursions it had stopped being humorous. Hell, the kid had almost begun to _notice_ towards the end there, and that was saying something, since, outside of certain key arenas, Kisame was overwhelmingly thick.

Itachi, on the other hand, was not. (This was ice to be tread carefully, perhaps.)

His baby cousin scoffed derisively and turned away from him again to say, wordlessly, that the conversation was over.

This did not come as much of a surprise. Of course, a lack of conversation on Itachi's behalf always meant that he had meandered back into his silent, chaotically internalized world of thought; _type_, what did he mean by that. "Type." Noun. A subdivision of a particular kind of thing, usually pertaining to individual preference in regards to aforementioned article. In this context, to be best equated to, "attributes found within an individual with whom one would most prefer to fulfill one's biological imperative."

There was quite a bit of trouble with this particular definition of the word "type", beginning with the fact that Itachi had no desire to ever fulfill his biological imperative. For one thing, he had done an egregious amount of research and determined that he stood to gain nothing from it, financially, physiologically, or emotionally. For another thing, Itachi rather disliked people. He especially disliked women. Women, in his experience, were, on average, almost seventy percent less likely to subscribe to a primarily logic-based school of reasoning. Their decision making patterns were, statistically, most heavily influenced by romantic and sexual interests, empathy, and moral and integral values. Men were, for the most part, similar; Itachi enjoyed their company no better. But men were less likely to make something of his company than women. In an environment filled exclusively with males, Itachi was less likely to be bothered or interrupted than if he were placed in an environment filled exclusively with females.

The fundamental problem was that Itachi indeed had no type that he could think of.

He sheathed this line of reasoning, since it made his stomach churn.

"Don't ignore me."

Shisui was grinning like a cat, reaching out to tug at his cousin's hair. Itachi had a 'thing' about hair, there really was no other word for it. Touching his hair made him _incredibly_ uncomfortable, which only served to amuse Shisui to no end. "I imagine you to find girls who are taller than you attractive. I couldn't surmise _why_, my darling little frigid bitch, but taller than you, certainly. Black hair, black eyes, generally Asian, in any case. Rounder faces, not like Japanese women, but.. ah.. Korean? Perhaps. You tend to stare more when they have rounder faces. Not fat ones, but. You have a type, of this I am certain~"

Itachi whipped his hand away, eyes flashing in their sockets.

"What is the motive behind this line of questioning."

Shisui laughed outright, throwing his arms loosely around his shoulders and digging his knuckles painfully into the top of Itachi's skull, raking his fist back and forth _hard_. "The _motive_? You make me sound like a criminal." He kissed his temple with a smack, chest rocking with laughter at his cousin's rather pointed discomfort. The child could _not_ take harassment of any sort, it was adorable. "The motive, Watson, is that if I don't check up on you, how on Earth will I be able to send Mikoto her monthly update reports on your personal life? For you see, without those, she turns into a merciless Hydra that feeds on my fear and destroys my rather flawless skin with _fire_."

Itachi elbowed him away, barely resisting the urge to drive his elbow into his windpipe, and began brushing himself off, as if he were set on removing even the particular evidence of Shisui's being from his clothing.

"I don't see how any of this is your business."

"I'm your cousin. We've been over this."

"You are a meddlesome fool."

Shisui grinned, kissing his temple again a tad more tenderly. "Yes, but. You are in love with me."

Itachi spooked away from him like he'd been bitten. Like he was venomous. He stared at him.

Like he was venomous.

Like he should leave.

Right now.

"And I am in love with you."

And the breakdown was inevitable. No, he could see it. Itachi was already halfway in, receding quickly. It was a short transition from indifference to disgust to cold, icy rage that hums below the surface of the skin.

He stared, eyes a warm, glowing crimson in the light, eyebrows two strokes of ink.

Shisui smiled, a tad darkly, watching him with the sort of penetrating look that had always half-frightened Itachi since their first acquaintance. "Cruel, Itachikun. Such a _negative_ response." He ran his hands through the mess of curls that hit his shoulders, brushing it out of his face and resting his cheek in his palm. The problem with Shisui, as with all people of his personality type, was that you could never _really_ tell if he was serious or not. All of his expressions were some variation of the previous voice, and his voice inflected merrily even when he was seething with rage or sadness. Shisui, in that regard, was _far_ harder to read than Itachi could ever hope to be. "Though I can only surmise _why_ you've got that look of homicidal intent all over that pretty face."

Danger zone.

Itachi eyed him. His face was composed in a fortress. A barricade. Shisui could only see gaps of him through the arrow slots. It was a cold landscape in Masyaf. Unfortunately for Itachi, Shisui did not understand the social concepts of personal space. Not when it came to him. Was he _actually_ in love with the antisexual little brat? Shisui didn't know. Shisui didn't care to invest in those types of thoughts, they were distracting and kept him away from the main goal. Itachi was too darling to not corrupt beyond repair, and that was Shisui's right _alone_. The girls Itachi stared at too long, girls who matched a description that was essentially _him_, they could just _wait_.

He grinned, hand jetting out and tugging Itachi's hair tightly.

The younger snarled and snatched his hand in a grip that seemed contemplative as to whether or not to crush his bones to powder, but Shisui didn't seem particularly phased by it, watching him for a moment before yanking him forward with a force that didn't match the femininity of his arms and kissing him not so much _hard_ but certainly quite firmly, the grin in his lips evident by the shape of them against his cousin's mouth and his fingers hooking back into the very straight hair that wasn't like _his_ at all. (He really, _really_ should have seen that one coming.) He laughed like a jester against him, the kiss only lasting for a couple of startled seconds before he ducked away in time for his lips _not_ to be shredded off with Itachi's _shark teeth_, kissing his forehead and amusement rolling out of him in audible, familiar waves.

"You should _see_ your _face_."

Itachi promptly kicked him into the wall, with admirable flexibility and strength, and managed not to tear a hand across his lips. His mouth was drawn so sharply downward that the edges looked barbed, and his eyes bubbled with ire.

He forcibly ousted Shisui from his room, then, and with the door shut and locked so quickly that the sounds seemed synonymous, the following silence seemed intent to swallow the world.

--

Shisui didn't get to see him again for something like three _weeks_, which he chose as the strategic amount of time to drive Itachi absolutely crazy with whatever he would be consumed with. Itachi was a far too complex person all over for him to successfully pretend Shisui hadn't kissed him, the child simply _thought_ too much. It was what Philosophy majors were _supposed_ to do. In that three weeks, Shisui discovered he had a rather potent talent when it came to watercolor painting, a talent he hadn't previously been aware of, and more interesting than that was the open space for development. As an Uchiha, that called for him to be a genius, that's the flavor Uchihas _came in_. But artistic skill didn't come from that side of the brain, and had so many different angles to be approached with that he found the hobby rather fun. As a result, he'd suddenly begun skipping even _more_ of his classes and simply remaining in the art building, watching the art majors (girls with paint on their jeans were _adorable_, you see) play in their studios and modeling for a handful of them since he'd had nothing better to do.

Being painted naked was a lot _less_ awkward than he'd originally suspected, if truth be told.

Of course, it was all strategy. There was no room for it not to be. He was as he was, and as he was, not seeing Itachi for a few _days_ was uncommon enough, dating back to their time as children. Yes, by now it would be less of a held grudge and more of a thick, putrid mire. He knew his cousin well. Yes, by now he would be power brooding, refusing to sleep or leave his room. It was like an elaborate, live action version of chess.

And when Shisui _did_ finally run into him, he'd been relatively sure Itachi had been looking for him, not like the brat would ever cop to something so degrading, because he'd been taking the same route to class he always took, a route which never intercepted his baby cousin in their history of _being_, when Itachi had simply been there. And he'd nearly choked on his riceball at the sight of him, not prepared to enact the second phase of his strategy, hacking _quite_ attractively and only barely keeping a mouthful of rice from spraying in painful, half-chewed chunks out of his nostrils. But nonetheless, he _had_ avoided what could have been a memory he looked upon in disgust for the rest of his days. Nonetheless Itachi stared at him blankly, doubtlessly aware of how close Shisui had just come to either dying of asphyxiation or of public embarrassment. As usual, he said nothing about it. He didn't need to. The look said everything.

(Said, if perhaps more eloquently, something along the lines of, "My God, look at yourself. Aren't you ashamed even of your own existence? I most certainly am. Fool.")

"Good morning to you, too."

Shisui's tone was intently cold, purposefully dismissive and nonplussed to try and sting him in whatever way he could. Regardless of how distant Itachi was, or how mad he was trying to be, Shisui was his closest friend. Had always been his closest friend. And that meant a lot to anyone, even a person whose emotional scale was minuscule, if nonexistent. He strolled past him, portfolio under one arm, his hair a good inch longer now and getting increasingly difficult to maintain. Another inch and he'd be wearing ponytails every day. Or pigtails, if he was in a fag mood. Shisui was very strange.

Itachi's head turned owl-like, unblinking (what was that American film...? The Exorcist?) as he passed, his lips thinning in a way that Shisui noticed, in a way that meant his temper was overwhelming his typical nonchalance. There was something about this that sent a tingle of delight shooting down Shisui's spine.

He did not tell him to stop, nor did he fall in step with him. He stood there, arms folded, and caught the end of one spindly brown lock of hair and pulled Shisui around by it sharply.

Itachi was glowering.

His feet span to avoid the most pain he possibly could (because unlike Itachi, he did _not _have a thing about hair. Hair was the crap on top of his head every morning that would probably be more convenient if he shaved off, but he wasn't going to because shaolin warrior wasn't a good look for him. And college was a time when looking good was kind of a priority), expression a bit flat and a thumb hooked into his jeans. "I'm going to kiss you again if you don't let go." Itachi did so, so promptly that it was a bit insulting, expression unchanged.

"You will not," he said, voice darkened and grave. "Not now and not again. Do you understand."

"I don't. Actually."

Shisui leaned forward and kissed his forehead chidingly, rolling his eyes as he pulled back and turned away from him. "Until next time, blackbird~?"

Itachi seemed to barely resist the urge to cold cock him. There were too many witnesses.

But the skin of his forehead burned.

And he seethed with rage.

--

Shisui came across him again a good week or two later at a campus restaurant. This wasn't quite as by chance, but it - nonetheless - wasn't truly intended either, though he'd been with a girl, which made the look on Itachi's face all the better. She was an art student, one of his friends who talked too much, enough so where he didn't himself have to speak, and while she'd been babbling and he chewed over a mouthful of chicken in rice, Itachi had stepped through the door with the same look on his face he always had. The flat, nonplussed, unstimulated and uncaring _bore_. Itachi's face. Shisui'd only sighed, the absence of time spent with his best friend making him uncomfortable and lonely, swallowing a mouthful of noodles and watching him intently.

Itachi noticed, it was clear, and immediately steered his eyes to Shisui's, which was a sick, almost aching comfort in a small way. Kisame towered along his left side, skin so black it seemed to devour all the light directed thereupon, and as Itachi's stare drifted into the realm of vaguely uncomfortable the shark's eyes travelled along it. Had it been any other person, it would have seen strange for so long and obviously dangerous a creature to coincide so directly to the actions of someone so much smaller than itself.

But they both knew Itachi was the bigger one, really.

There was a small envelopment wherein Shisui became vaguely suspicious that Kisame might be privy to the goingson between them - he often felt this way, as it were, as if he and Itachi were capable of communicating everything through heartbeats and swift, sharp glances. In the center of the dining commons they looked like two wolves biding their time in the midst of a sheeply ocean.

Itachi turned his head.

Kisame grinned and his sharp fanglike teeth glinted.

Shisui stood, smiling in that pleasantly fake way of his, that way that successfully threw off everyone he ever came to know, intercepting them and the paint caked under his nails taunting Itachi in a subtle, vague way. Their relationship was old. They'd known each other in more than this lifetime, that was a certainty, and the current one was built upon foundations of misunderstanding. Of Shisui being a brotherfigure, possessing the knowledge of a mentor and the mentality of a fox. Combined with the humor of an Uchiha, this made him _impossible_ to understand, and that was really the only reason Itachi kept his company. The child fixated terribly with the things he didn't understand, for there were so few of them, and Shisui was a person whose nonsense was a parody of its own. Like a puzzle game that fit together perfectly, except for a few pieces left over that had no place to go.

"I've not met you."

He smiled with a sultry, warm-draft-in-a-cold-room sort of way to Kisame, hip swayed at a bit more of an angle and a strip of his skin visible between his paint-stained shirt and uniform pants.

Kisame snorted through his large, flat nose and eyed him with a predatorial sort of amusement. His eyes were a cold, dark grey, like the edge of a knife, and he surveyed him.

"You've met me plenty, Uchiha-kun."

"I hardly recall~"

Kisame snorted again, a low sound, like a boar rooting about in mud. Itachi's eyes were weighing heavy on Shisui's face, flashing from where he watched over a deeply wary shoulder, but the older of the two made a point not to meet them. First, isolate them. Make them mull over what happened to the point of half-obsession. Then, make them jealous, a jealousy that will heightened because of how much they'd thought about it, and even more so if the object of rage is a close friend. Itachi was too cruel a soul to fall in love with him _before_ having sex with him, despite how much Shisui would have preferred it that way. So, instead, he was doing the reverse.

He was going to fuck him until Itachi _screamed_ that he loved him.

He leaned forward a little, everything about his actions subtle, and let a couple of his fingers snag Kisame's biceps lightly, peeling paint stretching slowly across his hands and up his arms, mostly shades of cream and black. "Come eat with us, hmm?"

Kisame's body composed itself elegantly beneath his fingers, athletic and firm. He watched him, seeming more clever than he was simply thanks to his posture, which was amicably suave, his shoulders dropped loose with his gigantic hands in the pockets of his cargo pants. Shisui had no reason to assume he understood what was going on.

He grinned. "Sounds hazardous to my health."

...then again, it gave one pause. Scientists had long speculated as to the awareness of baser animals than they, after all.

"Ah, but what is a good meal without a tad of food poisoning~?"

"I'm in for way more than a tad."

Shisui smiled, tugging him away from his very cold looking cousin with a bit more pressure. "You're in, then? How lovely. Come along, I'll buy you something full of cholesterol and pockets of blood."

Kisame would have said something about wording himself wrong - he had meant that he was "in for more than a tad," in that considering he did, he had a distinct feeling that food poisoning would be the least of his problems - but he wasn't really one for tact or brains, and as it was, he was doing his best not to attract Itachi's attention. He was doing an excellent job of it, too; even as Shisui moved away, hips swaying ever so slightly in a sashay, he could feel the weight of those eyes trained on the back of his head.

They left him standing there. A lonely little black dot in the middle of a vast, wary ocean.

And Itachi seethed.

--

Exactly two months after Shisui had first kissed him was when he scouted him out with a purpose. His hair had gotten long enough to be in a ponytail at all times, slowly beginning to resemble their elder uncle's, and for that reason, Itachi would make him cut it back to shoulder length where it belonged. School wasn't Shisui's element; collegiate nonsense required too much intellectual stimulation for subjects he cared little about. He'd confided in a couple of his new friends about this (if you could call them such; his frequenting of the art building resulted in several acquaintances that found his direly strange personality of great, foreign interest. Like a shiny new toy that begged to be played with), and the general consensus response was for him to simply drop out. When Shisui stated, quite dully, he did not _want_ to drop out, they told him to take more philosophy classes and get a girlfriend.

Visual arts students weren't the most verbally articulate people. Paintings spoke thousands of words, and that was lucky for them, because when an art student was asked what his work meant, most of the time he couldn't tell you. He could _try_, if he even bothered. But often didn't. And so, on a whim and enjoying the look of annoyance at his roommate every time some surface of their apartment stained with paint, Shisui had changed his major from Undecided to Art, and signed up for five art classes for the next semester and _zero_ cores. After all, if he didn't like painting or printmaking or drawing as much as he did right now, he could always just change again. Education was a service industry. If he was paying for his education, he had every right in the world to decide what he was going to learn, especially since his career path probably _wasn't_ going to be his choice.

But anyway.

It was two months, two very, very _long_ months when Shisui found him again, sitting in on Itachi's oral communications class as he so often used to, but always in the back. He was there because it was his day to speak, and watching him speak was always lovely because although Itachi was a silent, increasingly depressive _monster_, he had the ability - on rare occasion - to pretend he was not.

The topic of discussion today was, according to the blurry outlines projected behind the podium, "Outrageous Scandal: Corruption as Measured Daily and as it Affects You and Your Classmates." From what Shisui gathered, sharp chin resting on the plush flesh of his palm, each student was to do a satirical speech of three minutes or less on a controversial topic of their own choice. Itachi was second in line, which he rarely allowed for, and so Shisui got the opportunity to watch him prepare himself, which was a rare and golden treat.

He did not ramp himself up -- from what his cousin could see there was no obvious way in which he changed at all from being who he normally was. For all the rest of the classroom knew, he was listening intently to the loud and passionate declarations of the current speaker, who had decided to speak of dredge netting and its effects on dolphin populations, of all things. But Shisui knew better; he saw the soft, impatient fettering of hands; the way Itachi's deft fingers slid his speech from under his book so that he could glance it over one last time; the way one hand seemed to find its own, idle way to the ends of his hair, which was held up higher on the back of his head than it normal would be. Itachi was entirely absorbed in himself, the way that geniuses often are, but there was a sort of manic obsessiveness to it. The lines beneath his eyes were more deeply grooved than usual; his eyes themselves were a pale brown, and his body seemed more rigid, his wrists thinner.

When the boy had finished, he descended from his proverbial soap box, seeming deflated, and Itachi rose without waiting to be called. The professor made no remark, watching from over the huge stacks of paper littering her desk, and the room seemed to go a degree quieter. Itachi walked down the aisle slowly and with a distinct purpose, and then up the steps of the podium; he set his speech down there, and paused to take off his glasses. It was so quiet that you could hear as he set them alongside it.

He closed his eyes for a moment. Opened them. Looked down at his speech. Closed his eyes again. Exhaled. Opened them.

And then he began:

"...in our country," he said, slowly and with deliberate precision, "less than five one thousandths of a person out of 1000 people is a victim of intentional homicide.

"This rate is lower than almost every other recorded in the world; it is lower than that of Denmark, Hong Kong, the United Kingdom, or the United States. It means that there is a possibility that no one in the classroom will ever be a direct or indirect victim of intentional homicide -- a rate of .5%.

"However," he continued, placing emphasis on the word so that it stood alone, "if we instead examine how many individuals in this classroom will be directly or indirectly in need of an organ transplant, the number jumps by thirty six times to no less than 18%. That is one in every three hundred and fifty people in Japan.

"This rate is also relatively low. Worldwide the numbers vary due to many factors, including but not limited to availability of proper medical care. In China, one in every 96 people will need an organ transplant. In Bolivia, one in every 48.

"But the predicament I wish to discuss is not entrenched in the problems of singularly this rate; it lies in the correspondence between this rate and another, and the disparity between the one in every three hundred and fifty Japanese who require an organ donation, versus the forty organs for transplant that have been legally and officially donated since 1997."

He had them, now; Shisui saw it and it gave him a strange sort of pleasure. Itachi seemed to wait patiently, reeling them in slowly as if by two of eight legs, carefully threading them deeper and deeper. He did not move or shift his posture.

"And so, as in all cases where there is a vast disproportion of supply to demand ratio, those who are in need of organ donations have begun to proposition foreign, illicit markets.

"The organ trade is not only real, it is incredibly lucrative. In areas where destitution pervades, and the prevailing winds favor greed and desperation over tenacity, organ trafficking has become an industry that generates millions of dollars in profit each year; of the 70,000 kidneys transplanted annually, 14,000 of them are black market organs. In Brazil, one human kidney can be bought for just under one million yen from a donor, many of whom make less than twenty one yen each day.

"In China, the average 8,000 prisoners who are executed each year, are harvested for their organs, which are then most commonly sold to the wealthy sick in this country for upwards of 6.8 million yen."

And then he saw him. It was almost slow motion, and it was somewhat thankful that he had already finished his sentence, or it is doubtful he would have finished it all. Itachi saw him, and all at once he froze up, a plethora of intense emotion bleeding into his face like the bleat of a lamb. He stopped dead, staring at him for a moment.

Shisui did nothing.

And slowly, Itachi began again.

"In every three hundred and fifty people, one will need an organ transplant at some point in their lifetime." He gave pause. "That one, statistically, could very easily not be you. But, on the assumption that this class has a collective average age of approximately 19.89, and that each individual therein has met at least one person for each day that they have been alive -- "meet", as defined by the parameters of have been introduced to and shared with a brief dialogue -- it is safe to say that each of you knows no less than approximately 7,264 people. That means that, even if you are not one of the three hundred and fifty people who will be in need of an organ transplant at some point in your lifetime, you know no less than 20 people who will. And, if the current trend goes unchanged, no less than 14 of them will obtain those organ transplants illegally."

"And no less than six of them," he concluded, smoothly, staring Shisui in the face, "will die."

Shisui stood as he clapped, attracting attention to himself that both was unnecessary and unwise, but he didn't care as he strolled down the levels of the lecture hall, lingering out of the way until Itachi stepped down from the podium, before taking his arm with something that combined a rough clarity and a sincere warmth. He spoke in his dignified, incandescent voice, a voice that melted mirrors and kept spiders at bay, but what was missing from his face was a smile. Smiles, you see, they threw people off. Depressed people, angry people, sad people; society both detested them and knew all well how to deal with them. The disillusion in Shisui's smile was something most could _not_ deal with, but on this occasion, it was missing from his face, all that remained a line in his lips, devoid of everything that made him _him_.

"Come with me."

Itachi, surprisingly, did so without pause or exaggerated argument, which made Shisui quite certain that it had been the Right Time to make his move -- surrounded by people as they were, what a strange, adorable little cousin he had! Such an orator and yet so averse to attention.

And yet he _was_ averse to attention, and so he was painfully quiet as Shisui led him out.

He tugged him into the hall, looking around for a moment (it was empty, though a security camera was blinking at them around the corner) before turning towards a supply closet, yanking it open, and pushing his cousin inside. The room had only one light, which blinked like a strobe for a slow-action camera, and about fifteen class sets of rare or outdated textbooks the students weren't supposed to know about, and when the door snapped shut behind him, the maximum amount of room they had from each other was eight inches. Eight inches that Shisui closed _immediately_ by kissing him fiercely, protective and possessive all at once, locking him close by winding a hand to the back of his neck and his opposing working a vicegrip at his bony hip.

(Did you _miss me_~?)

Itachi's knuckles made contact with his cheekbone so ferociously that it knocked his head into the doorjamb with a crack.

(Apparently not.)

"_Ow_."

"Do _not_. Do that. Shisui."

"But _why_."

Itachi hit him again, this time in the stomach, apparently for asking quiet the wrong question. It _hurt_, the way he did it with his thumb wrapped around the fingers, driving hard bruises, melon-sized bruises in to him, and Shisui only took it for a few seconds or so before catching his cousin's fists (both of them, for insurance) and towering over him, so much _bigger_ seeming when he wasn't smiling, able to completely shroud Itachi at all angles if he hunched over. He sighed, kissing his forehead once, then the top of his head as he forced Itachi's hands stagnant, running one of his knees between his legs. "That's not a _reason_ and is very _rude._"

Itachi wrestled one of his hands back, shoving their faces and bodies forcibly apart, jaw set; he seemed quite close to baring his teeth. He held Shisui against the door with one hand knit against his collar, other hand clenched in a fist so tight that Shisui could feel it in the tendons of his wrist.

"That I have ordered you _not to_ is sufficient reason."

"What have been up to, in the past two months?"

The change of topic was abrupt, but the tone of his voice (which was in its rare state of _not_ perpetual joking) attempted to convey he actually cared. Because he did. It wasn't the reason he was _there_, it was a conversation reserved for later. But for some reason, it had been the first coherent thought after recovering from the blow to his head. And Itachi only hit him again, kneeing him in the side. His eyes glinted in the dark, seeming almost manic; black gold, oiled and shining as if some dark knife. (Speaking of... mm, but perhaps it was best not to prematurely assume Itachi had brought no weapons with him. Not that it was congruent with his personality to do so. But then.)

"What right have you to ask anything of me."

His voice shook. He was impassioned, how rare; he seemed so much a child.

He appeared to reach the limit of Shisui's pain threshold because the latter let out a cry, grip on his cousin weakening dramatically as his nerve endings exploded with reaction, reeling back all of six inches and smashing hard back into the door. "Goddamnit, Itachi," he snarled, holding his side. "You are quite the little _bitch_."

Itachi recoiled from him as if struck, looking simultaneously petulant and disgusted; there was a tinny clatter as he inadvertently backed into the assorted brooms, mops, cans and plastic containers population the floor behind his feet and the crowded shelves behind his head. His face emptied, but the movement was inadvertently clumsy and he seemed embarrassed by it; he had left his glasses in class. They lay unattended on the wood panel of the podium. Shisui realized, somewhat tangentially, what that said about the limits of his vision; he must be nearly blind.

"Open the door." He was still nearly shaking, either with rage or passion, Shisui did not know.

"I can't."

He spoke with a faded sort of lopsidedness, skin still throbbing as he noted Itachi's reaction. (Shisui rarely swore at him, let alone called him names, which both made his insults all the more shocking and all the more likely to sting. He hated that about himself. Hated when his and Itachi's relationship took a tumultuous turn of any sort because Itachi was _his_. Had always been his. His cousin, brother, lover; semantics hardly mattered. But regardless, Itachi _was_ his. And thus, he hated hurting him for any reason that wasn't psychologically educational. But that was for another day.)

He leaned forward and kissed his lips chastely, blindly but on target.

"Please stop hitting me."

Once more, Itachi's hands pressed him away, but his strength seemed to be waning with his anger. Shisui swore he felt those long bones tremble but it must have been his imagination.

"_Stop_. Shisui."

"Would it really make you happy if I did and disappeared from you."

Itachi, for what decency he actually possessed, froze momentarily, his limbs taking on strange, angular shapes. Shisui paused, watching his outline before stretching his hand out to touch his face testingly, the skin cold and his cheekbones jetting out dramatically. Itachi hadn't been eating enough, that was _more_ than obvious, and he felt a sting of burning guilt crawl through him with the same consistency as wriggling maggots. Mikoto and Fugaku spent little time at home, and what little time they were at home was spent working, sleeping, eating, or having sex on the rare occasion their days off were scheduled together. Which meant Itachi was now becoming responsible for feeding himself, which he _could_ do just fine - he'd been feeding Sasuke most of his meals for several years - but rarely remembered to. Even less so if he was consumed with his work.

"I'm not sorry." He cupped the other side of his face, thumbs moving over his cheekbones to the corners of his eyes.

"I said _stop_."

"Don't make it like I'm assaulting you." Shisui sighed, running his fingers through the gorgeous hair that burst in even locks out of Itachi's pale scalp, kissing his forehead and then under his left eye, like an afterthought.

Itachi snarled low but left it at that, because there was no point in arguing that it was. He pushed him away again, backing himself into a corner, a broom prodding his side, and Shisui just sighed, leaning over him and mouthing in half-kisses over his cheek. "I'm wondering exactly _why_ you thought to take refuge in a painful area of this claustrophobia inducing space that in fact has _no_ means of escape." From his cheek to his jaw. From his jaw to his mouth, hands moving to lock him into place and humming with a gentle adoration that clashed with a feral sense of impatience, swiping his lips with his tongue and grinding with a slow but almost _ungodly_ friction into Itachi's groin.

"Mm~"

The younger of the two hitched and grabbed him by the biceps, hands so tight that they cut off the circulation to his arms. His whole body seemed to seize up.

"_Shisui_."

"I'd wondered what that'd sound like when you moaned it." He nipped languidly at his bottom lip, itching to run his palms all over him where they belonged but well aware that if he let go now, he'd probably get stabbed in the throat. Which wouldn't be pleasant at _all_, no it wouldn't. "And I have to say." Shisui broke it, fingers stringing sweetly through his hair as he felt his hands begin to shake, the blood in his veins unable to reach them with Itachi's vicegrip. Leaned forward and kissed him sweepingly, not like any of the previous in the combination of dominance and love and possession and rage and confusion that crushed through them, so much emotion that it nearly made him sick.

"You didn't disappoint."

Itachi seemed to flounder as Shisui dragged his discontent from his mouth, dredged his refusal from his throat, eyes glazing open like sores. Shisui could feel his pulse jumping behind the skin of his dry lips; there was a deep, intense humiliation dripping into his lungs like antifreeze, cold and blue, and he felt as though he were steadily drowning in it. He could not swallow. Shisui's hands were like bits of hot metal. There was a putrid mortification making its way down his spine. Surely not. No, surely not, he was thinking, though perhaps not in words but in algorithms.

He stopped breathing for a moment. Each searing kiss scrambled his numbers. He felt an intense, deep fear sweep through him like a fever, and even as he pressed it down it incited an irrational panic, and he fought to ration it. Each touch muddled his process, and he felt himself becoming so irritated that it choked him; he hated it. He hated being touched. He hated being interrupted mid-thought. He hated it with a vehemence that surprised him, a depth that made his stomach twist and his chest ache and burn.

But Shisui knew this. Had always known this. And had always seemed completely undeterred.

His knees cracked softly when they hit the floor, far louder than the minimal pain would have reflected, teeth grinding in his mouth, so irritated with his behavior, so fucking _hurt_ by it and so fucking furious Itachi not only had the ability but the means to make his stomach twist like this. Shisui _hated_ that about him, hated how desperately unfair it was that God would send him something to cause him this much trouble only for it _not_ to end up a terribly sappy but wonderfully darling little love story, like it was supposed to be? It was wrong. No, something so gravely cruel wouldn't happen, not if Shisui had anything to do with it, and as much as it disgusted him to confront it, he knew that if he couldn't make Itachi fall in love with him _normally_ (I.E., being best friends for over ten years), then he would merely have to do it abnormally.

And he was going to start now.

Both of his hands fixed bruisingly on the sharp bones at Itachi's hips and he snagged the button of his uniform pants between his teeth, tearing it straight _off_ (though not without some uncomfortable resistence) and yanking the zipper down along with it. He spoke clearly, if not angrily, faced flushed halfway with embarrassment (... geez.) and the other half simply out of irritation with him. Out of a complete lack of patience. "Itachi. Do not punch me, kick me, or maim me in any way. Shut the _hell_ up and let me blow you." He grabbed him almost roughly, eyes narrowing with concentration and pumping him slow, thick, and almost _painfully_ tight as he tugged his underwear off his hips.

Itachi exhaled as if around a rock, hands slamming back against the wall, as if desperately trying to crawl away from him, even as his eyes leveled on his face with a morbid, unwilling fascination. His whole body twitched as Shisui's mouth made it's most intimate contact and his pupils dilated to a comical size, his facial muscles seeming to go numb as his chest and stomach clenched, bunching together in tangled knots.

Shisui let out a soft, almost agitatingly calm sigh, looking him over for a few moments (moments longer than normal, since he was in the dark) before leaning forward and sucking the tip, curious and languid and _slow_, not to startle him, though he had no doubt he could get him off in twenty seconds if he had the desire to. But he didn't, he wanted to _savor_ this. Not the act itself; it was lewd and not intimate or romantic enough, not the way it _should_ be. But the flickers of everything that flowed in and out of Itachi in thick, almost wall-sized waves, so obvious to Shisui who'd known him for so long but so adorable _subtle_ on any other measurable spectrum.

He twisted his tongue slow and gentle over him, still gripping him tightly at the base and jerking him off thick and with intense amounts of care, precision, digging into the slit as a bead of precum leaked into his mouth. Cruelly bitter. The way Itachi would have tasted regardless. It occurred to him how rarely Itachi ever succumbed to his own damnable sweet tooth. He wondered, slowly, how much effect a bit of well-timed _dango_ could effect--

But never mind that, what about that _face_, wasn't that just disarmingly exquisite. The way his lips trembled slightly, as if he were fighting the urge to sink his small white teeth into the lower; the way his chin became less sharp, more ambiguous with his uncertainty; the way that Shisui was certain that if the scene were lit, he would be wearing that perfect blush of his, the one that barely changed his tint, the one he had worn last when he was ten and Shisui had told him that incredibly filthy, smutty joke and Itachi had pushed him into a swimming pool; the way those long, butterfly-wing lashes fluttered, slightly. Perfection. Truly.

Now if only he could be a tad less difficult.

A tad. Perhaps.

He shuddered slightly, involuntarily, letting go of him and working him deeply into his mouth and quite _cautiously_ into his throat, brushing his hair over his ear and holding Itachi's hip more now for support than control. The floor was cold stone, not like marble but more like smooth concrete, and his kneecaps were already beginning to ache. Not that there was anything he could do about it in a room as small as this. He felt the threat of his gag reflex coming on as Itachi neared dangerously close to his uvula and withdrew back, the vacuum of his mouth unimaginably tight and slick, working backwards to the head again and starting a slow, calculated rhythm, trying to take in details he couldn't see, and it only proved to frustrate him immensely. Details that he _deserved_ to be able to see.

Shisui pulled back entirely with a lewd little pop, twirling his tongue over him and speaking clearly in the kind of voice that couldn't really be said no to.

"Turn on the lamp."

"No."

...of course he would say that. God, couldn't cooperate for the very life of him, could he.

But there was comfort to be had in the _way_ he said it. It was almost a squeak -- so embarrassing, his voice was sharp, like a door banging open, and it vanished into the dark just as quickly. It was almost a gasp, and though Itachi obviously tried to keep it quiet by buckling his mouth once more after it was said, the ragged edges of his breath caught his lips and the sound raked up Shisui's back like a raw, illicit eroticism. He said _no_ like it was less of an order and more of a plea. A _no_ to be preceded by God and to be followed by _please_s and _anything but thats_. The older of them purred sweetly, skin crawling with attraction like he'd been introduced to a pheromone for the first time, starting in again but faster now, not taking the time to torture him the way he'd planned to because he wasn't on _carpet_ (for one), and for another, Shisui simply couldn't. Even if he wanted to.

Perhaps he was in love with him.

He groaned softly, head bobbing at a faster pace so that there was a quiet _thud_ of skin smacking skin the back of his throat, his teeth brushing across him as infrequently as humanly possible and his tongue always moving, drawing Kanji characters all over his cock just to keep busy. Just to keep him shaking and shuddering like that, so adorable and so out of _control_.

"Shi_sui_--"

But it was the last thing Itachi said for a long time. It was the last moment his head remained above water and then he was beneath the water, bound and helpless. It was a strange, foreign sensation, to be physically overwhelmed in a way that disrupted his mental processes, and he felt battered, swept by a rip tide, nasal passage burning as the salt of Shisui's control infected him, infesting his blood. He battled it feebly, with paper knives and plastic swords, wearing armor made of styrofoam, and Shisui barreled inevitably through him. Itachi broke into him, quietly, hands whiteknuckled along the wall, sharp hips pressing against the bones of his cousin's chin, which was moist with a cooling mixture of precum and saliva.

He didn't choke (albeit he should have, since he was drastically inexperienced when it came to deepthroating), but he jumped sharply, the hand crushing his bony hips lessening in force as he eased into it. Eased into Itachi, whose personality was a highly familiar territory (he knew, for example, Itachi's favorite color was white, although he would argue that white was not a color, it was a tint, and that he in fact _had_ no favorite color. But he did. He knew Itachi didn't like the cinema because it overstimulated his eyes, which were sensitive and tended to be unreliable. He knew Itachi's favorite book was Anna Kerenina, knew Itachi watched him when he thought he wasn't looking, knew Itachi was _fiercely_ protective of his baby brother, and knew he was unaware Fugaku was beating him. Because if Itachi knew that, he wouldn't be here. He would be with Sasuke. Shisui knew his brain worked in numbers, not in concepts, which was why he liked Philosophy. It forced him to think on planes that it wasn't natural for him to be on, forced him to be smarter in ways no IQ test could measure. Knew Itachi was homosexual and had _no_appreciation for the female figure. Knew Itachi hated snakes and loud noise, and had an _intense _phobia of being naked. These weren't things Itachi ever said. He was a silent creature by nature, but a highly complex one. Something deep in the sea.) - but whose body, Shisui wasn't familiar with.

Not at all.

He undulated his throat, sucking around him in melting, horrifying waves, things that made Itachi _unbearably_ warm from the abdomen and spiking through everything else. That made him weightless and unbearably heavy at the same time. Shisui pulled back and dug his tongue _hard _into the slit, squeezing him tightly and pumping him with his first. Entirely too quiet. Itachi could hear his own breath and his heartbeat, and it both enthralled and enraged him, and he was not paying attention to his hands, which were clenched at his sides, but his pride kept them from clasping them over his mouth as some part of him so desperately wanted to do.

The pleasure was wrenching; nerves that had never been stimulated in him were stimulated to the point of breaking, driving holes in his bones and his reserve. Something spread up his chest in a wave of pungent warmth and he bit down, crushing one edge of his bottom lip between his teeth.

He felt immobilized.

Shisui drew forward and took him to the back of his throat, fists clenched as he mentally meditated his way through not gagging, taking deep, cold breaths through his nose and inhaling the highly distinctive coital scent that was boxing around them, thicker than blood and almost dizzying, pulling back and tongue swiping the three characters of his name at the head of Itachi's cock.

shi  
su  
i

(Mou, I love you so.)

When Itachi came, it was a surprise and a humiliation.

A pleasure and a victory. Perhaps.

--

He did not really know what to do, afterwards. There was a long, intense silence that absorbed them for a short moment and then they were set back where they should have been, with the exception of the fact that Itachi was still heaving for breath, and Shisui was still on his knees in front of him, staring up at him with eyes like accusations and lips like evidence.

He did not really know what to do, afterwards. There was a long, intense silence that absorbed them for a short moment and then they were set back where they should have been, with the exception of the fact that Itachi was still heaving for breath, and Shisui was still on his knees in front of him, staring up at him with eyes like accusations and lips like evidence. He stood after what felt like ages, both of his knees popping loud and hysterically painful, though it didn't show in his features that he registered it at _all_. He raised a hand to the string of metal beads hanging from the ceiling and tugged it, and the single light bulb at the ceiling flickered on above them, too bright but altogether far too dim. Itachi recoiled as if he'd bitten him, seeming to snap into place - he whipped around to conceal himself, pushing Shisui away with an arm he kept outstretched.

He only laughed and wiped his mouth, licking the back of his hand quietly.

"Is this the part where you storm off as if I've committed a grave injustice by inducing your first orgasm."

Itachi said nothing, despite the way the word "orgasm" nearly made him flinch with shame and disgust, facing the corner like a disobedient child, with his nose at the very convergence of the walls. He stood straight, his posture inflexible, completely mute. There was a shadowiness to it. Shisui watched him, tongue moving in his mouth like a housewife around a new guest, pressing Itachi's bitterness into the wells of his teeth. "You're homosexual and in love with me. You realize this."

Itachi released his forefinger and thumb from his nose and let out his breath in a thin, uneven stream, taking back both of his hands and pressing them to the wall in front of him, head hung and eyes closed.

"...no."

"You really ought to get out of the closet. It must be a terribly cramped lifestyle."

"Open the door, then."

Shisui sighed, withdrawing a postcard from his back pocket and sliding it neatly into Itachi's front.

"I'm in that exhibition. You should go."

He spoke with a clear solemnity, unjamming the door and letting it open with a soft creak, not bothering to leave himself but allowing his cousin to pass first.

(Once upon a time. There was a garden on a high hill, green and blossoming against the sea. And when the sun came, and the rain came pouring down, the garden grew and flourished and splattered bits of color on the ground. It took shape and symmetry, and all of the life around. But there came winds driven and howling, there came snow, and I feared for the garden, so I built a wall. And I built another. And I roofed it over, thick and strong, and kept it from the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. The killing cold could not get in, but when the sun came with the gentle rain of spring, they could not reach the garden behind those walls. It would have died. Safely, securely, died. But as I longed, and as I learned, I tore the walls all down. The garden still lives.)

--

**A/N**: Heya, internets 8D chapter one finally finished amsnsmfsd! This, the prologue, and the rest of the story is being cowritten with my best friend in the _universe_ Lamb. Who needs to stop being so effing _hard on herself_, thankyouverymuch. She is providing pretty much 100% of the Itachi characterization. Because her Itachi is insanely good, A, and B, she's an amazing writer and we work super well together ;A; she's posting this fic on LJ while I'm doing so FFnet and AFFnet. So everyone who's going to review, say hello to her~ 3 she is mai waifu. (Speaking of which: this chapter is over 11,000 words long. It took us three weeks to write. It will take you 60 seconds or less to review. If you don't do it, I'll sick Darth Jesus on you e__e;) aaaand yeah. Lolblowjob.


	3. Chapter 2

_**Mind Gardens  
**__Chapter Two_

God had constructed Itachi as an object of cruelty. This, Shisui had realized quite a long time ago, but it had taken him a long time to word it properly. They were the perfect words, really; rather, that one word, "cruel." It described the exact, sharp downward angle of Itachi's eyes. It described the thin brushstroke of his mouth. It described the intoxicating perfection of his body. It described his intellect. It described his personality. Itachi was a cruel beauty, a cruel mind, a cruel tongue. And most cruel, of course, was the aloof, inadvertent way of him; the cruelest thing was that he was this way not on purpose, but by design. Itachi was an object of feverish amour to the point of intense loathing.

His exhibition was on a Tuesday in mid-May, a week, as he'd said, after he successfully initiated Itachi's entry into what was basically adulthood (he hoped), or at the very least, the sexual realm with himself as head and sole proprietor. And as his bruise turned from black to a putrid, rotting sort of greenish brown, he became more and more certain of the fact that he had a bit cheated over the course of the whole thing. I mean, honestly. Itachi had gotten to beat the shit out of him _and_ cum in his mouth? And he even swallowed. Surely that was worth something. He had behaved himself admirably - yes, been nothing short of saintly, and his baby cousin hadn't even bothered to call him afterwards.

He thought it was about time he did something about that.

Step 1: Bait/lure.  
Step 2: Redemption.  
Step 3: ?  
Step 4: Profit.

And why not work on getting some, while he was at it? Surely there was no law against that.

There _was_ a law against sex with minors. But hell, what kind of person was both interesting _and_ law-abiding? And, Shisui thought, he was certainly the former.

Quite certainly.

He'd been working steadily for several days, locked up in his room and transforming whatever space could be spared into studio space. His roommate, whatever his name was, hadn't been pleased with the development, but had been far too frightened of him to dare tell him what _he_ thought about the ordeal. Thus, Shisui's room now smelled like concentrated turpentine, the shower - which he'd used for splattering - was now stained in every color imaginable, the windows were covered with paintings hung up to dry, and everything had a stain _somewhere_. Really, he didn't need to be working so hard - he was only a Painting I student - but he thoroughly enjoyed playing with colors. Learning how to paint inevitably forced him to learn how to see color, and now he was seeing things in ways he'd never before. It was liberating.

So, relatively speaking, Shisui was happy.

And, for that matter, prepared.

The day of the exhibition arrived without complication right around the time when it seemed What's-His-Kun might be preparing to formally voice his opposition, and several of his prettier female classmates (whom Shisui suspected had been part of a biker gang in their past life) helped him carry out his pieces in their low-slung paint spattered jeans and their sexy makeup. The set up was in a well-attended wing of one of the science buildings on the main campus, a place with cherrywood hardwood flooring that gleamed and white walls and lighting fixtures that he supposed were designed to have a minimalist modern sort of chiq look to them. They didn't, but he supposed that was the initial intention of them.

Set-up took about an hour; the trick was to make the organization of the pieces aesthetically intuitive while not being too overwhelming, or focusing too much on just one artist. There were twenty students in the department, after all, who had been asked to show, and that meant a gravity of what was, for the most part, excellent pieces of amateur art. There was one set he didn't like, where the artist claimed to be abstract but was really just a photorealist with a sense of spacing and proportion that was so sloppy, Shisui wondered if he had ever actually seen a human being in his entire life.

He wore a cocktail dress for no other reason than to wear one, a flimsy little red thing that hugged his barely-curves obscenely and made him look even more effeminate than usual, and when his roommate had inquired - mouth hung open in shock - what the _hell_ he was doing, Shisui had shrugged as he laced up his Chuck Taylor's and said: "Going to my exhibition, you nosy brat", in that cruel way of his that made Takano-Takeshi's eyes widen in discomfort and a chill envelop his nerve. It should be said that relatively speaking, Shisui looked pretty good. The kinds of people he associated with (excepting Itachi, of course) were all strange enough to not see anything about him strange at all, and Shisui was far too comfortable with his sexuality (that is, he liked women but _loved_ Itachi) to see anything gay about being a guy and wearing a skirt.

He was simply an island of himself, moated in disregard and home to the surrealistic jellyfish and sea turtles of his toxic waste ocean.

He skewered a Swedish meatball, which a friend of another exhibitee had been kind enough to provide as refreshment (along with a bowl of punch), and plopped it into his mouth, watching the clock. His cousin wasn't the type to show up late, fashionably or otherwise.

Rather, he was early. Not so much that he mingled with Shisui's associates, but early enough to be one of the first people let into the exhibition. He was, per usual, dressed immaculately, in a way that revealed absolutely nothing about his body except that dark colors became him. He wore a soft blue pinstriped button-down and a dark dinner jacket, left open, and he milled dutifully around, sliding out of Shisui's sight so furtively that it was as if he'd planned it each time.

Shisui finally caught him by one of his favorite pieces.

"Cousin!"

The eldest of them smiled in that dazzingly sickening way, sipping his drink and leaning into him just barely, but more than enough to get his attention. Itachi shied from him, if barely, wearing a familiar expression of vague disdain. He took a moment, as he always did when something was amiss, and Shisui smiled a bit wider despite himself as his eyes strayed with unnecessary length to his dress.

"...is there a _reason_," Itachi said, finally, "for you to be wearing that."

"Why of course. I look delectable."

"I hardly find that particular descriptor appropriate."

"Meatball?"

"I dislike the innuendo implied by your segue."

"..........would you like to consume a delicious Swedish Meatball provided by a wholesome culinary major for this equally wholesome spectacle."

"I'm not hungry."

Shisui sighed, expression flat. "You _would_. How do you like the work?"

Itachi watched him for a moment, before turning back to the piece in front of him. He seemed to take a moment to formulate a response.

"...technically," he said, "I am able to appreciate it's complexity. But..." He hummed softly behind closed lips, mind whirring so loudly, Shisui could almost hear it working through his skull. "...I am admittedly somewhat amateur in regards to my abilities to appreciate much more than that. I feel very little of it elicits any sort of emotional reaction.

"...not that that should surprise you."

Shisui scoffed, the most he could do to retort the vague sense of disgust and even more vague sense of hurt at his response. Hardly the sort of reaction he'd desired, but anything more or less wouldn't be Itachi, and he knew that. "It's a still life, you fool. No emotional reaction is meant to be elicited."

"Is it impossible to have an emotional reaction elicited by the message intended by a wooden bowl of fruit?" Itachi looked over at him, almost curiously.

Shisui sighed dismissively. "Don't ask that question. Ask _why_'s not _is_'s."

"...you're offended." It was a statement.

"I know not what that word even means."

"You are offended by what I have said."

Shisui smiled disarmingly, placing a hand on his hip. "Flitter about the rest of the exhibit, won't you. The mass of the people will make themselves present within the next thirty minutes, and I want you to look at everything before you leave in a mess of social phobia and bad temper."

"...as you wish," Itachi said slowly, still examining him as if he would like to take a sample of his skin under a microscope, if only to make better sense of him. It took a second before he detached from that area of the floor and went gliding slowly off.

Shisui remained awkwardly quiet for the rest of the evening, whatever sense of confidence that he usually carried himself with now absent and replaced with an unusually heavy dressing of self doubt about his aura. He was the self assured type, always had been and seemed lackluster without such qualities, and in the wake of watching his cousin's halo of black hair occasionally peaking between people, Shisui found himself unable to hang around any longer. For that awkward, nervous feeling he felt unaccustomed to was _not_ going to overcome Uchiha Shisui, no sir, not even slightly. He'd jogged back to his dormitory, changed into clothes he was more comfortable in (that being a pair of stained jeans and a v-neck), and jogged back, hair up in a ponytail, only returning for the purpose of greeting those who'd decided to show and indeed _quite_ surprised to see Itachi still there.

It was more to his character to leave rather than loiter.

He flushed, just barely, with a bit of embarrassment, hooking a thumb in his beltloop and meeting his eyes. "Cara mia."

Itachi tipped his back away, but the movement seemed subtle, almost involuntary, almost as much as the blush that streaked down his face to pool around his neck.

"...why did you leave."

Shisui grinned foxishly, brown eyes almost gold underneath the street lamp and leaning closer to him, inhaling softly. "It was uncomfortable to wear."

"That's a lie."

"Now, now. Don't be so quick to assume that because _I'm_ the one saying it."

"Statistically speaking it is not unwise to do so. And besides that..." Itachi surveyed him, not wanting to tear away from his fingers, but really not liking to be quite so close to him, considering...recent events. Did he have to ooze like that, really. (He did. He really did.)

".......it wasn't my intention," Itachi said, after a significant pause. Shisui surveyed him right back before smiling a coy little smile that only served to suit his face perfectly, reaching out to toy languidly with a lock of Itachi's hair and letting out a little sigh. "I'm coming home with you tonight."

He expected token resistance.

Itachi provided none.

"Fine," he said.

xx

They arrived at Itachi's home around an hour later; the maze of trains and the short stop Shisui made back at his dorm for a toothbrush and change of underwear in and of themselves didn't take such a long time, but getting take out for dinner did. They'd ordered from one of the little holes in the wall that looked like an ideal place for drug deals, and as always, were given far too much food that took an annoyingly long time to cook. Only occasionally did Shisui ever touch him, these little flitters of contact so sweet and so simple they could nearly be considered chaste, bare little touches that made the hair at the back of Itachi's neck stand completely on end and made his spine crawl with cold reaction without fail. Whatever it meant to feel so tossingly negative each time, he was unaware.

"U_wa_, have I informed you before you that you are a spoiled little brat and that your home is the bane of my existence?"

"Seems a rather unfortunate bane seeing that I live there, and that it is an inanimate place of residence that can neither reciprocate nor cower in the wake of your feelings." Itachi let them inside with his key and looked away as he held the door open, listening for something before deciding that the coast was clear enough. Their steps echoed along the marble in the entryway, and Itachi changed out of his shoes automatically, even though there was no need.

"Not so unfortunate, seeing how every time I am here, you are here. Up we go."

He pattered along to the elevator, which had been installed by the previous owner, who spent the last few years of his life bound to a wheelchair. It was a nasty little affair, but the man hadn't died here, so everyone operated on the idea that if ghosts did exist, the house was somehow exempt from the rule. He pressed the button and immediately, the doors opened, and they crossed inside, and although it took all of his self control to not drop the takeout they'd waited nearly half an hour for and ravish him right _there_, Shisui was in a but of a mood by the time they were on Itachi's floor. It was hard to notice, only in that he wasn't vocalizing it, but perhaps the fact that he wasn't vocalizing it only made it more evident. He flopped on Itachi's bed, crossing his legs and pulling his styrofoam box from the plastic bag, popping it open and starting in on the chicken and curry.

Itachi swatted him off his bed because he was an anal-retentive little miscreant who was quite loathe to find anything but cotton fiber between his sheets, and sat himself on the floor; they rarely ate in his room, and it was small, and the strong, damp smell of the food soon filled it up to the window, so that Itachi was obliged to go and open it. The air out side was still, but invasively cold, and it sunk into the room like an ill-mannered guest. They ate in relative silence for a very short while, Itachi picking birdlike at his food and making a small dent in his sticky rice while Shisui watched him.

"...must you stare," Itachi said, interrupting him.

"It's hard not to, I cannot lie. You're gorgeous like a colorless, odorless, tasteless poison."

"...you're completely nonsensical."

Shisui smiled and prodded him in the forehead, swallowing a mouthful of curry that was supposed to be spicy, but food cooked by the Japanese was _never_ spicy enough, and thus it was always only halfway satisfying. He uncapped his waterbottle and washed down the food he'd eaten too fast, which was going to start hurting his stomach within the half hour, and let his eyes drift back to him as he started in on the fried rice and soba. "That may be so. But then again. How is sense unlike a crystal? Madness on the outside, but delicate, perfectly-honed little structures that are as exact as ducks in a row or soldiers at attention?" He slurped a noodle noisily, chewing briefly before swallowing and letting out a contented sigh. "I believe that all things which are truly, defenselessly _sane_ must wear masks of great and deliberate insanity so as to take a place in this cosmos. Because, my love. Crazy people are _so_ much easier to deal with."

"You are incorrect to a point that I assume tapers into pure self-delusion," Itachi said, rubbing at his forehead and wearing a frown. A prawn was balanced between the chopsticks he held in his opposite hand. Shisui only laughed softly, taking a bite of bread and chewing it slowly, legs crossed meditation style and letting out a satisfied little sigh. "Would you like me if I were at all like you?"

"You _are_ like me," Itachi said, dully.

"In what way."

"In nearly every way," Itachi said, setting the prawn down at the side of his styrofoam container, untouched. "In manner of intelligence. In manner of philosophical belief. In manner of heredity and genetics. In manner of collective promise and investment. We are not so dissimilar, either in appearance or in mannerism. ...perhaps in fortune. And, perhaps most of all, in our interactions with other individuals of our race.

"But scientifically speaking, we are very much alike."

Shisui sighed, watching him quiet and, perhaps more strangely, with content. "I disagree. But that is to be expected." And for whatever reason, the conversation made him think of his first kiss. Perhaps it was because he was staring at Itachi's mouth, which would be a pretty sight if it weren't always pressed together in a thin line that meant he was in trouble, but it drew him back to when he was thirteen. His first _real_ kiss, it should be specified, not the little naive kisses because he'd had plenty of those from the time he was four, as he'd been _born_ to be a ladykiller, it seemed. No, the one he had at thirteen was with a girl named Pak Eunmi, who had - in retrospect - looked _just_ like Itachi and had been underdeveloped enough to feel a lot like him too. It had been an awkward kiss, but nobody - including he - could ever forget their first kiss.

He smiled softly, sipping at his water.

When Itachi looked up and caught him staring, again, he did not shift his eyes.

"...what are you thinking of."

"Sucking you off."

Shisui lied so much it could be considered compulsive. Not that Itachi's face didn't make it worth it. Blood shot through his cheeks like rose ink.

"Don't be crude."

Shisui grinned, putting down his food and shutting its lid. "Stay still. I want to try something."

"_No_." Itachi moved sharply away from him, in a movement so automatic and fluid that it was insulting, but Shisui just _laughed_. Being told his artwork evoked no emotion, _that_ had been insulting, not because he couldn't take criticism, but because he couldn't take Itachi's criticism when the child showed so little emotion himself that he could be deemed a sociopath. _That_ had been an insult. Itachi jerking away from him, afraid of touch, afraid of _him_? That wasn't insulting. Shisui laughed in his _face_, because this person, this perfect little wrath that was a breathing, biotic artwork and an island of himself in ways endearingly similar to the way Shisui was, he was afraid of contact.

Of something so inherently _normal_.

As natural as nudity.

Shisui grinned and leaned forward, nuzzling his cheek. "It won't hurt and you won't have to take anything off."

Itachi slapped his face away not forcibly; he passed it away from himself by the back of his hand, as if refusing a serving of tea.

"No."

"Why not."

"Because I _refused you_."

"But _why_ did you refuse me."

"Because I found your proposition unappealing."

Shisui sighed. He was so agitating. Itachi had the ability to give very simple, straightforward answers, in fact, he _was_. He simply wasn't choosing to actually answer his question, and he hated that about him. He took his left hand in his own, lacing his fingers like it was something curious and obscenely unique, pausing quietly before taking the other and exhaling a small breath. "Nothing to it." Itachi seemed to falter in his certainty. A moment passed before he jerked away, and not nearly violent enough; his hand lingered in its same position before it closed, seeming lonely but reserved, small in it's closed, finite shape. His eyes rested too long on Shisui's hand, so welcoming and innocent in stillness.

"...please," he said, without realizing he said it.

And with that, without warning but with all the affection he could muster, Shisui leaned forward and pecked his lips in a kiss that was so chaste it might as well have been the first one they ever shared. Itachi's breath went sweeping out of him, like birds from the rafters of a Gothic church. His motionlessness felt heavy, but Shisui only smiled that awkward smile of his, the one that reflected his maturity and distance in whatever form it tended to take, and kissed him again, another naive little brush of the lips as he took his hand again and relaced their fingers.

Itachi let him, longer than it seemed he meant, and until the kiss had lengthened almost into something else entirely, and Shisui's body had positioned itself close enough to his that he could feel the heat from his skin, and his breath as it wafted along his upper lift, and he turned away sharply.

Shisui let out a severely disappointed whine, nuzzling his neck and hands moving to his sharp hips. "Itachiiiii."

Itachi moved out from under him as much as his position would allow, skittish and deeply uncomfortable. He refused to look at him, which seemed only to serve to further undermine his pride and make him cross.

"Cousin, what are you doing. _Really_."

"...why do you pursue physical intimacy with me."

"Because it would be highly beneficial to both of us."

"In _what_ way."

Shisui let out an oh-what-a-bonekiller-you-are-

sweet-love sort of sigh, clapping his hands on either side of his face and leaning forward, pressing all of his weight in and kissing him firm but in a slow, adoring sort of kiss. It was a comfortable he was expecting to end far quicker than necessary, the way their lips moved together adorably warm and languid, no part of him constrained or in pain because none of his clothes were skin tight, everything so natural about it, like they'd been dating forever. And in some manner or another, they had. Shisui pursued intimacy with Itachi because Itachi was in love with him and in severe denial. How could he not be; how could _they_ not be. Even when he sat there like a block of wood, Shisui could feel the tilt to his head, not quizzical or conscious, but so perfect. And the way his lips shivered like that. Ah, so cute.

He sighed, almost wanton, arms wrapping around his neck as he traced his tongue in slow, coy swipes along his lips, fingers digging lazily through the hair at the back of his skull. It vibrated quietly whenever his jaw moved, whenever his vocal chords vibrated like he was going to speak but never did, and Shisui held him close, if not maternally, nuzzling him softly.

No one broke it -- it tapered, naturally, in lieu of breath, and a warm, close proximity. Itachi's eyes weren't closed but they were so glazed that Shisui could see himself even in the whites of them. He scooted a little closer and kissed him twice, the first chaste and closed mouthed, like he was asking for some kind of permission, and the second more intimate, longer and more pressing, holding him in place by his hair but not roughly or harsh.

Itachi didn't fight him - though, for a moment, he sensed might (there was an undue tension in his jaw that he could feel through his mouth). The hair was such a nice trick, in the end. A predictable fetish. Itachi stayed motionless, as if he was waiting for something. But Shisui only swiped at his lips softly, little invasive gestures, hands moving down to his hips to wrap around them and pull him closer into him. (Itachi reminded of things he usually tried not to think about. Like the idea that what went up _must_ come down. That the breakable _must_ always be fixable, that what went around would eventually come back, and that every action had an equal and opposite reaction. Itachi made him believe that these solid, genuine laws weren't true. That he could do something and it could be sent into the oblivion of space and time, that it could genuinely mean nothing and that would be that. That if a tree fell in a forest and when no one was around to hear it, it genuinely did not make a sound.

The empty.

Pointless.

Like a child dying of thirst daring to cry.)

Itachi unhinged them like gears and inhaled sharply through his mouth, although he tried to keep it quiet so that Shisui would not construe it as a gasp (though it was). He blinked, seeming to return to himself, disoriented and dizzy, as if Shisui had been holding him underwater. He backed away, hands pressing at his chest.

"Shisui..."

He ducked into him, kissing him softly, three times over.

"Itachi."

A thin, sharp hand pressed into his throat, and Itachi pushed him away, turning his head as if coming back to himself.

"...stop. Stop."

Shisui sighed sadly.

"Fine."

Itachi eyed him suspiciously, seeming to examine him like an egg for cracks.

"................ but _why_, I love kissing you."

He shuddered in what seemed like revulsion.

"...do not use that word."

"Why do I repulse you."

"...you do not repulse me. Your actions repulse me."

"No, they don't. You enjoy them and we are both aware of that. Some societal standard that we can't be together makes me repulsive to you. And that is disgusting. You have no reason to submit to that, you're not a _part_ of normal society. You're better than that. You've got the third highest tested IQ of anyone _alive_, what the _fuck_ does it matter what anyone thinks. It's just you and me against the entire world, and believe it or not, you're going to need me. Despite my apparently being the last thing you want."

Itachi stared at him for what felt like a very long time before reaching out and slapping him half-heartedly across the face.

"...are you. Delusional."

He paused to let his question dangle but continued, as if he did not necessarily want it answered. "Are you daft, what about my actions have portrayed unto you any degree of umbrage taken with the quality of your character. Even when you repeatedly force affections onto me that I have tried my best to communicate are unwelcome, I return to you. I eat with you. I allow you into my home. I attend events I would otherwise not attend. Which of these actions has communicated the contempt you claim?"

"The action involving you being deeply in love with me but still rejecting me."

Itachi balked slightly, making a face like he could spit. "Do not use that word, I will not tell you. Again."

"Why. What's wrong with it."

"...do you understand that-- No." Itachi shook his head vaguely and lowered his voice with his eyes, speaking more to himself. "Evidently, you have failed to deduce from my actions the degree to which I dislike being apart from and ignored by you."

He seemed to mull over this, and then looked up. "I have no understanding of love. None whatsoever. My understanding of the majority of emotions, most especially as pertains to relationships between individuals. But I am very aware of what I do and do not like.

"Do you have even the remotest understanding-- Shisui." He was near hissing between his teeth. "Whose house do I live in."

"That's not a valid arguement!" Shisui's voice was equally quiet, barely above a whisper, but still, the anger in it was unmistakable. Anger and hurt and flurries of emotions that fluttered in the cushioned sky of his consciousness. "Because you hate me to touch you no matter where we are. It's not about fear of your mother and father because no matter how far away from them we are, you still feign paranoia. But it's not about that and if you knew yourself in any _fraction_ of the way that I know you, you would understand that." His white, straight teeth were gritted together, and his fists were clenched, physical reactions to isolate himself from Itachi's words that blatantly contradicted everything he did.

"I hate anyone to touch me," Itachi said, his logic seeming to taper into something frigid. "I have always hated anyone to touch me, you unrepentant fool, and still you insist, endlessly, you insist, and now you insist upon doing things that are socially unacceptable to a degree that may lead to our prolonged separation and so I refuse you that you might get ahold of yourself, you repugnant imbecile."

Shisui blinked as if he'd been struck.

Itachi did not take his eyes from him.

"I cannot make you see through violence. I cannot make you see through peaceable dialogue, or through consistency. What need I do, Shisui. To bludgeon through your thick. Skull."

The eldest said nothing, still just staring back at him, eyes a little wider than usual and hissing all kinds of rage, all kinds of hurt. It was a distance Itachi wasn't used to, couldn't be used to, for all of the cruel flickers in his face that screamed _traitor_. That screamed How Dare You, because how dare he. Shisui was an emotional creature, a passionate little thing, and Itachi knew that. And was taking advantage of it. It generated a thick unease in Itachi but he managed, to his credit, not to flinch or recoil from him. Shisui was a storm, dark clouds brewing in a thick maelstrom of anger and betrayal that he knew neither how to reason with, nor how to defuse. It made him deeply uncomfortable, and so he schooled himself in preparation for a fight, thinking that this only proved his point, things would be so much easier, so much simpler, if Shisui would just relinquish all of this ridiculousness. There was nothing appealing about this situation, about the arguments, about the abstract complete lack of interest he had in any kind of intimate relationship with anyone, and why did Shisui need this sort of thing of him anyway, why couldn't they return to their simple... But was friendship really the word for it. And didn't this sort of thing indicate that if it was a friendship, Shisui was dissatisfied with its nature. And hadn't he professed to want this all along.

Itachi knew not, and either way the prospect did not interest him at all. He blocked the possibility from his mind because it was an inaccessible area of unexplored blackness that did not draw his curiosity or interest, but rather his avoidance. No, he would rather not think about that at all.

He hardly realized when the beats of silence turned to rhythm of heavy footsteps at the end of the hall.

In a second, Itachi seemed to extinguish entirely.

Shisui backed away from him too fast, drawing back into himself but that unimaginable emotion still coiling in his eyes, picking up his Styrofoam box and returning to his food, eating it in thick mouthfuls without stopping for water as the inevitable knock came to the door. Itachi's forced-calm '_come in_', and the knob turned, and he felt Fugaku's looming presence behind him, watching him with the same condescending disgust that his son had stared him down with only seconds before. The prospect only succeeded to piss him off even more, and as he chewed, he felt an unbearable, sudden pain that had him blinking tears as his teeth almost _tore_ through his tongue, every one of his muscles going tense as his nerves alighted with fire and the spices in his mouth collided furiously with the open wound.

"You're here, Shisui?"

He stood up, trying to control the natural reaction to _that much_ sudden pain, fists clenched and holding the box.

"I was just leaving."

In his peripheral vision, he saw Itachi's head whip around, his face painted in an expression of surprise, dismay, and brewing discontent. Shisui did not look at him.

Fugaku did, however. "Itachi. Get dressed. You're to accompany me to the office."

"Now," he added, irritably, when his eldest son remained motionless.

"...of course," Itachi said, so quietly it was remarkable Fugaku heard him.

xx

The weekend passed quietly, but on the following Monday, Shisui came across him eating lunch at the cafeteria and gave him an all too kind smile, shifting his portfolio into the other arm (it contained all of the artworks from the previous exhibition) and sitting down with him. Smiling confused people. It was disarming in ways that a deep frown or eyes brimming with tears and content could never hope to be; it _hid_ things. Because it lit up the face naturally, with joy that may or may not have been there. Shisui pretended nothing happened, and for all intents and purposes, nothing had as he sat down and took Itachi's water bottle from his tray, uncapping it and swallowing a mouthful.

"Good afternoon, cousin."

Itachi stared at him. He had the telltale haggard look of someone who had not slept well in several weeks.

"...what do you want. Shisui."

"To eat. Since you're not." He glanced at the untouched plate of food in front of him.

"Forgive me my appetite."

"I'll do my best."

Itachi's eyes narrowed.

Shisui's only rolled in agitation. "If you're going to be like that, I can ignore you until next semester."

Itachi's hands snapped into sharp fists and then tried to make as if they hadn't. He didn't seem to know how to say what he wanted without giving away too much. "...I wonder if you understand how irritating you are," he said, at last, voice grating. Shisui's smile widened another half inch up his face as he took a pair of chopsticks from the table and swiped a mouthful of noodles from Itachi's tray, chewing it slowly and shrugging his backpack off his shoulders. The gesture was an anchor-dropping of sorts, and he crossed his legs loosely. "I likely do not. You see, I find myself _quite_ adorable, and I'm afraid I'm not the only one~"

"If you would like to break out into a song and dance routine, there are more appropriate audiences." Itachi eyed his backpack before looking back at him, seeming not to care at all about the quickly disappearing food that Shisui spirited off his plate.

"... I was extremely tempted the moment you said that and you should be aware that despite all of the temptations, I resisted it."

"I will make a note in the official record."

Shisui laughed, scooping up another bunch of noodles and holding it front of Itachi's lips. "Eat it. You're skeletal."

Itachi studied him before turning his head. "I'm not hungry."

"Eat it."

"Do not order me."

"You're so humorless."

Itachi stared at him blankly until he withdrew the noodles from his face, which Shisui opted to eat because not bothering would obviously be a waste of already wasted effort. "I declared my major on Saturday. Painting." He didn't really have a reason to tell him, other than that he couldn't think of anything else to say, but the strangeness of it really couldn't be overstated. That an Uchiha would not only dare to use a college education studying something besides business, but in not studying business (acceptable alternatives could be political science, pre-law, pre-med, and various forms of applied sciences) - he was studying something that wouldn't contribute to the corporation. The only form of art that could _possibly_ be useful would be design work for advertisements and marketing, but no. Shisui hated design. It was too simply, too clean, too pointless in all of the ways the strict family he'd been born into believe that _painting_ was pointless.

Fugaku, oh, he didn't need to imagine, he _knew_ what Fugaku would say. Nothing, as it were. Nothing and with that same god damned condescending face, as if he were the presiding judge of all things significant and useful. He would make that same face he made whenever he caught sight of him; as if he were something hideously dead and rotting.

Not that he particularly cared. No, Fugaku's face did not particularly weigh on his conscience but for the fact that he knew that face could be broadcast in Itachi's features. That, he cared about. Somewhat. Perhaps more than somewhat. So much that it rent his insides and made him angry enough to cry.

But Itachi did not make That Face and he did not recoil and he did not look about to betray or judge him.

"I think I might take classes over the breaks as well. I have nowhere to go either way; spending the summer in a rental apartment again would be a waste of time and money, and I doubt I could give a decent excuse for another trip abroad."

"...we have a guest room, you know."

Shisui blinked. He assumed - and quite rightfully so - that Itachi was still mad at him for _whatever_ it was he was always doing wrong, which he was _sure_ was nothing because after all, there was no sin in knowing what you want and going after it. A person like Shisui, who pursued Itachi blindly regardless of whatever rejection or obstacle existed, was the kind of guy that typically existed only in romance novels. Because in real life, there was a little thing that started with an _r_ and rhymed with _estraining order_. He stared into Itachi's eyes for a moment before smiling strangely.

"Don't offer something you don't want me to take you up on, cara mia."

Itachi's facial muscles didn't move. "It is an invitation to nothing but a roof over your head. Shisui."

"Accepted: no take-backs."

Itachi nodded, vaguely, eyes drifting elsewhere as he milled through the whirlwind of thought moving through his brain.

xx

Shisui came across him a few days later on the way back from a large superstore, struggling to carry several bulky bags (groceries, light bulbs, razors, trash bags, disposable dishware, and a bag of chopsticks) all the way from said superstore to his dormitory without getting something of value stolen. The sun had been nearly down by that point - it was quite late, later than it should be and Shisui had a tendency to spend extremely long amounts of time in a store looking for the cheapest thing that passed his muster because he was _so_ stingy - and so with the appropriate quiet that went along with a sunset, Shisui's discomfort was loud enough to attract plenty of unnecessary attention. To be technical, Itachi had spotted the ridiculous fool on the way into his dorm without being spotted himself, and had opted not to move from his bench, only - to his surprise - for his cousin to come back out of the building only twenty minutes later and nearly _immediately_ see him.

"Darling brat cousin!"

"Was that prefix entirely necessary." Itachi shut his book (a paperback edition of The Sound and the Fury) and looked up at him.

".... but you are darling."

"...is that so." Itachi didn't sound at all convinced.

"Of course. You remind me of cats. Did you know that the house cat is the only animals that self domesticated? A house cat can literally become feral at will."

"That seems unlikely."

"No, apparently self-domestication is a phenomena that has been going on for some time. It started in the Near-East, which I suppose means Mesopotamia. Anyway, according to what I read, the proof that backs it up is because there's no real difference between a domestic house cat and a feral cat, and there never _has_. There's no evolutionary paper trail, not like with most other domesticated animals. It's interesting." Shisui took in Itachi's blank expression and laughed. "To _me_, anyway."

When it came to their genius, Itachi really got the better end. Itachi remembered things that were important, sometimes interesting, and would probably grow up to cure cancer. Shisui remembered things he considered interesting. Granted, if he were in the same classes Itachi took, he would always be second, and occasionally surpass him when problems involved the creative and abstract thinking Itachi found difficult. But Shisui hated the kinds of classes Itachi took, and wished classes existed that were full of completely pointless information because pointless information tended to be _interesting_, while advanced physics tended to _not_.

"...you think that this information relates to me metaphorically," Itachi said, staring at him.

Shisui blinked. "...perhaps?"

Itachi sighed. "What do you want."

"I'm glad you asked. You see, there's a strong chance my roommate is going to lose his virginity tonight to some ignorant slut, and when I moved in with him, I told him if I was banging somebody, he had to go. And he responded with, well, if that applies to me, than if I have a lady over, you have to go. And I, pretty much under the assumption that that would never happen, agreed. And now he's got a date and I need a bed tonight."

Itachi stared at him as if he had just colorfully described a nightmare the two had shared, but seemed to shake it off with admirable precision and opened the fastening on his leather book bag to slide his novel inside. "Fine," he said, and he got up without looking at him or reaching for his phone, which was strange, because Shisui was well aware that regardless of where she was, hierarchy decreed that overnight guests permissions were to be approved by his Aunt Mikoto. But he didn't bother to argue or make voice of it. Itachi was too logical a creature for him to do anything without purpose.

xx

It was late when Shisui crawled out of bed. To be exact, it was 1:09 AM, and in his defense, it had not been his fault: he'd been having a dream and it stirred him out of his comfortable unconscious, a dream which set him on such a thought train that he couldn't pull himself out of it long enough to fall asleep again. In the dream, he'd been walking barefoot over something that had the feel of a desert, but after a few steps, he'd realized it simply couldn't be a desert. It was desolate, devoid of life and all lush greens, but the ground was dark, and the sky was red. As his vision came into focus, a voice in the back of his head told him he was at a nuclear test site. The conclusion was backed up by the sudden change of scenery: he was no longer walking on destroyed desert rock, but a destroyed, fake suburb. Complete with burning mannequins and houses reduced to skeletons.

He'd felt the urge to walk down the street because apparently, he had to deliver a letter to someone, when all of the sudden he came across an infant. The infant was unharmed, but the logical part of Shisui's unconscious mind had told him to take the child to safety, because it was in grave danger of all kinds of radiation burns and long term poisonings. So he, the baby, and the letter were all going to the town hall when the child turned into a bed of three-headed snakes in his arms. It was about 12:38AM at this point as his eyes snapped open in horror, the little ghost dream sensations of several hundred snakes wriggling in his arms disturbing him so much he had to rip the bedclothes off to make sure they weren't there.

And thirty minutes later, he begrudgingly got out of bed, stretched, and headed down the hall to Itachi's room.

There was no light under Itachi's door -- a rare occurrence, especially given the hour and circumstances. There was no sound to be heard from within but he could hardly believe he was asleep, and he wasn't, not really; Itachi rarely _really_ slept. If he did, it was never deep enough that he failed to wake at the sound of pin drop, and he had always been that way. It was his mind, really, it failed ever to stop working long enough for Itachi to lose consciousness, and besides that, he was predisposed to night terrors and sleepwalking, something which he had told no one about and claimed certainly not to fear, but Shisui knew about it, and he thought that if he was not afraid, he was certainly wary, and, thinking back to his own dream, he didn't entirely blame him.

He was most likely dozing, Shisui garnered from the sound, and a quick peek proved him right; Itachi lay still but noticeably restless on his side on his bed, facing away from the door. His room was immaculately clean and dark.

And although it occurred to him that bothering him at this hour would make the child unbearably grumpy, Shisui did not like the after effects of nightmares and did not have anyone _but_ Itachi to complain to them about. It made a lot of sense, truly, that Itachi would be a good person to talk to because of simply saying that it wasn't real, Itachi would say something like 'dreams are the results of electrical firings in the brain when it's not being used. There's no point in dissecting them,' likely followed by a small thesis paper as to _why_, and by the time he would be done talking, Shisui would not only thoroughly believe him, but be so tired from listening to things he only cared about for the first five minutes in a melodically dull tone that he would walk straight back to his room and go to sleep.

Or so was the plan if he didn't merely jump him.

He opened the door and pushed Itachi's computer chair next to his bed, sitting in it and watching him blandly. They'd been friends too long. And Shisui was the one who always acted like a child, but acting was always the key word. Itachi was more of a child than Shisui could ever dream to be. "Itachi." In a hiss. "Itachi, wake up."

Itachi's body twitched - he saw it in his shoulders - and there were a few moments of musty, pertinent silence before he replied as if he had been awake the whole time:

"...what is it, Shisui."

"I had a bad dream."

Itachi sighed and rolled over, sitting up. His head ached, hanging heavy on his neck, and looked over in the direction of Shisui's voice, practiced at finding the unfocused blur of him in the darkness. "Just now."

"Yes."

"It frightened you."

"That's what I said."

Itachi sighed again. "Hand me my glasses."

Shisui picked them up off the bedside table, sitting atop the same book he'd been reading earlier, and pushed them blindly into his hands, a deep frown implemented on his features. Itachi slid them over his ears and pushed them habitually up his nose, although they had already settled in the same place on the bridge, and looked up at him cryptically. His brow was slightly creased.

"Shisui. It was only a dream. There's no need for distress."

If it bothered him to feel stupid, if he had the kind of _pride_ the other Uchihas had, he would never be caught dead talking to his much younger cousin about nightmares. But Shisui wasn't bothered with the prospect of feeling stupid, he knew he _wasn't_ and tested ridiculously high on his last IQ exam, and he wasn't nearly as prideful about the same sorts of things his family were. The same things Fugaku was, who was downstairs in his office, typing away in neat, manufactured clicks that rung with whatever he was writing. There was always something to be done.

"There were snakes."

Itachi shuddered noticeably at the word before schooling his expression and looking back at him. He was far too level-headed for this time of morning. "Your subconscious mind was preying upon your instinctual and well-justified fear thereof."

"Mutated snakes with lots of heads. All wriggling together, hundreds of them. In a baby blanket. Which I was holding."

"...Shisui. It wasn't real. It was a generation of your own imagination."

"At a nuclear test site. With all of these fake people with their fake houses and fake lives being burned and melted into nothing."

"Shisui."

"What."

"It was. A figment."

Shisui exhaled a somewhat dramatic sigh, pulling his legs up into the chair so his knees bumped his chin and he could lace his toes with his fingers. "I know that." And the more he was watching him, the less he was feeling like this had a point at all. Just _seeing_ Itachi, looking that version of tired where it would be impossible to sleep, still half crumpled in his bedding and eyeglasses sliding bit by bit down the bridge of his nose, just _looking_ at him seemed to suck the creativity and imagination straight out of him. He watched him for a few moments before letting out a smaller, more subdued sigh. Well it was too late _now_.

Itachi's face softened, somewhat, the edges folding in so that they didn't look quite as sharp. He reached out a hand and rested it on one of Shisui's kneecaps; initiating touch, however subtle, which he never did. He felt strongly reminded of his baby brother and it sucked the harshness out of him and left an unwilling fondness behind.

"...you're whole. As you can see. You are in no physical distress. You are exactly the same as when you fell asleep with the small exception that you have now had a thought you did not intend to, and it bothers you."

There was a short pause before Shisui looked up, leaned forward, and pecked his lips.

"That is true."

(And braced for whatever overzealously negative response was to come.)

But Itachi did not move. He remained as he had been, and except for the slightest blush, which Shisui could barely make out in the dark, he did nothing.

"What is real, Shisui."

"I'm unsure, Itachi-kun. Am I a man in Japan, dreaming he is in Nevada. Or am I a man in Nevada, dreaming he is in Japan."

Itachi studied him for a moment, seeming to take the question into deep consideration.

"Assuming that you have affected my reality," he said after a second, "and that which I percieve to be real, and assuming you are real in and of yourself, rather than a figment of my own imagination, evidence would seem to be indicative of the former scenario."

"And if I was a figment?"

"I doubt my own creative faculties have such ability to create something so far-fetched as you, Shisui."

"If I was a figment, it wouldn't matter if I kissed you. You would agree."

"Do we assess the possibility of figmentation based upon that supposed figmentation's degree of agreeability? Because in that case...well, supposing that you find me to be, the majority of the time, disagreeable, and that you find the landscape of what we are assuming to be your dreams disagreeable, wouldn't that suggest that nothing is real at all, for you?"

Shisui scooted forward and kissed him again, holding him still with a hand at the back of his neck, digging into his mussed hair. "If nothing is real for me, that makes my plane of existence a blank slot, a figment in and of itself, which gardens the thought of what makes you and I so different so that one of us may not exist but one of does." He tilted Itachi's head back and sucked chastely at his bottom lip, eyes open and seeming abnormally large and frighteningly bright for an Uchiha. "And the answer to that inquiry is _what_, my sweetest love?"

Itachi's chest flooded with a warmth that tangled badly with his instinctive avoidance thereof, pulling his face back abruptly so that the unfamiliar tug at his mouth intensified before it stopped. It tingled with hot electricity long after, and he reached up to rub at it, self-conscious in a way that seemed sudden. He eyed him, suspiciousness sinking back into him, seeming to assess how dangerously close he had allowed him to get.

"..._cogito ergo sum_," he said, after a moment. "_Je pense donc je suis._"

Shisui nodded and kissed his swelling lip.

"Correct. I think, therefore I am."

"Don't kiss me."

"I can't promise that."

"_Shisui_."

"No, I can't _promise_ that." He spoke with a more serious, almost earnest tone, slipping off of the chair completely and onto his bed with him. "And don't make me, it's a cruelty and injustice both to you and to me."

"There is nothing cruel or unjust about it."

He let out a frustrated sigh, reaching out to rub at Itachi's browline and temple with his thumbs. "It is. It's to me because I very much want to kiss you and you're deliberately and without remorse keeping me from the thing that I want most, and it's such a _little thing_. And it's an injustice to you because you want it very much, almost as much as I do, but you've brainwashed yourself into believing that you, in fact, _don't_ want it. And that this is all, in fact, completely nonconsensual. When you want to touch me and like it when I touch you. You tell yourself that you hate it because you know your father would." He rubbed slowly into the crease between each of his eyebrows. "But you like it. And so I wish you would let me. Because it would simplify everything."

Itachi's brow creased softly beneath the pad of his thumb.

"That's preposterous. Simplify, this sort of behavior begets the exact opposite. How do you suppose this for even a moment _simplifies_ our relationship?" He was calmer, though; not irate so much as beleaguered. His voice remained quiet and even, although Shisui could tell by his eyes he was attempting to mentally dissect him, his actions and his motives. "There is nothing about this that inspires simplicity -- and for that matter, I don't see what--" He paused, then, his brow creasing further.

"...do you truly believe that my preferences are in any way linked to my father."

"I know they are."

"You're wrong." Itachi was giving him the strangest look. "And I have no idea what elicited such a thought-- Would you please _examine_ my life. Shisui. My father hates any number of things, primarily because he is an emotional infant obsessed with maintaining the illusion of dominance and control over his presumed domain and everything therein. You. For instance, are someone whom my father hates. You, with whom I have been friends for the vast majority of my life. Psychology. For instance, is something my father hates. My social inabilities are an example. My lack of interest in women is a growing irritation of his.

"And what do I care about any of that. It should be quite obvious that I indulge him only on the pretense of remaining where I can do the most good. Shisui. I am not a product of indoctrination."

"Yet you refuse to let me kiss you because he's in the house."

"I refuse to let you kiss me because I dislike it."

"Is that so."

"It is," Itachi said, slowly, examining him.

"Really."

"How many times must I say it."

"At least once more."

"I suppose this is where you kiss me dramatically and change my mind."

"How did you _know_?"

But it wasn't that dramatic; Shisui leaned forward, calm as if he'd _invented_ kissing, the hands that had been massaging his skull moving into his hair and brushing over his lips slowly, not quite _testingly_ but to get him used to the idea. Itachi shuddered, mouth parting without his meaning it, pulses of electricity moving down his scalp. It was adorably stereotypical, but Shisui purred in delight, sucking his lower lip but trying not to press him too much or rush him into anything he _actually_ might not want. He was hating this, having to convince him of everything; A, it made him feel like a sexual predator when he _knew_ he wasn't, B, it made him doubt everything he did which was _not_ a feeling he was familiar with, and C, he hated rejection. Everyone did.

Even Itachi.

Shisui kissed him slowly back into the wall, so that his back sloped, shoulderblades pressing into the cool surface, hands hanging uselessly at his sides. His hair, which had still been tied back, since Itachi disliked having it in his face, came loose under Shisui's fingers, and settled along his neck and shoulders in inky, salacious tendrils. He shuddered with delight, the room painfully silent except with the soft 'pop's of clinging skin being pulled apart, and for a moment, Shisui nearly understood Itachi's fear. Fear of what was _wrong_, because Itachi was buying into that, despite genuinely believing he wasn't. That incest was wrong, and likely homosexuality, and fear of the unknown is asking for a knife in the chest. Shisui understood him for a moment, just one, before he shook off the empathy syndrome and rubbed him thumbs over his cheekbones, in the tension underneath his eyes, seated loosely between his legs and running his tongue so-so slowly into his mouth.

He felt Itachi twitch, hand flying out to settle against his collarbone, as if to press him back, but it was obvious he was too late to think enough to stop him and there was no strength in his hands. His mouth pulsed slightly, teeth skimming the edge of his tongue.

Shisui shivered delightedly, sucking his lips and moving his hands slowly down his back, trying not to disturb him to the point of immediate rejection, but with Itachi, anything was a catalyst as long as he was given enough time to think. He ran his tongue under the points of his teeth, the muscle never cutting but the sensation - in and of itself - wholly unusual. He let his hand rest at his (extremely) narrow, nonexistent waste, the other still holding him still at the back of his skull, watching him silently and grinding into his hips. Itachi jolted softly beneath him, the tendonsof his fingers tightening at Shisui's neck, a small, sharp noise running between their mouths.

It was too strange -- Itachi felt, distinctly, that he was about to lose himself, that his consciousness was hovering at the end of a great abyss and being tugged by an uncouth summer's breeze, dragged hither and to by something he could not see or control. Their tongues brushed and his stomach twisted to the point of pain.

Shisui rolled his thumb over the point of tension between his eyebrows, rolling into his hips again but still, so slow and never too pushy or too much. Most of this was about conditioning. If he proved to him that they could make out without Fugaku bursting it, make out and have Itachi like it, then Itachi would do it again later. Their tongues twined slowly, the gap enough so Shisui could breathe evenly (though Itachi was rushing it and close to asphyxiating), and he let out a low purr as his cousin returned it. Awkward and uneven, but he did.

It was only a few moments before he began to come into it naturally; always the prodigy, Shisui thought, just as Itachi somehow bent his tongue to guide him into a pocket in his mouth he had not known existed, nestled right along his teeth and the heated inside of his cheek. He moved slowly, lips shivering like a babe's, body silvery and still, seeming like unfamiliar territory beneath Shisui's touch. He thought, perhaps that his best line of defense might be a good offense - an approach in order to best initiate escape, but he could hardly think, hardly breathe, and there was no way for him to process how he might manage to do so.

He knew that to avoid startling him, he _should_ talk him through it. But Shisui didn't, he didn't have the patience for it, an let the hand at his waist fall between his legs, gripping him thickly through the thin material of his pajama pants. (Mou, Itachi-kun. You're darling.)

He started badly, his whole body flinching, his eyes cranking wide open as his fingers tightened to the makings of bruises on his collarbone.

"Mm--"

Shisui rolled his hips and pumped the fist around him, trying to wind him down, kissing him a bit more earnestly, if not distractingly. He mewled into his mouth, so attracted to him that it was starting to get _painful_, reveling in the quiet of it all, how _naive_ it was. Kissing blindly in the dark, never talking, only breaking for breath, and every breath taken a deep inhale of air before it was lips again. Never overwhelming, never strangling, never too much. Shisui ran his tongue through his mouth, and every time Itachi reacted, every time he kissed him back, let alone initiated contact, Shisui's hand moved faster.

Itachi's breathing hitched, the center of his chest seeming to give inward, bending in at the ribs. His kisses went weak, mouth filling with soft, involuntary noise. His hips jumped, as if to dislodge him, but there was no doing it. Shisui let go of his hair and worked the material down off his hips just enough so that he wasn't getting him off through the fabric (exactly the kind of thing that would irritate Itachi to no end), but he slowed down, kissing him pressingly, waiting for him to respond but his stomach panging with want against the little noise he emitted.

Itachi jumped, the cold on the bare skin of his legs hitting him like water in the face. He spooked, badly, mouth breaking from Shisui's.

The eldest watched him.

"If you tell me to stop, I will not."

Itachi shot him a look, body splayed and lewd, shivering in the dark.

"So please do not tell me to stop."

Shisui leaned forward and kissed him again, slow and closed mouthed, resuming to stroke him slowly and hike his body temperature up again. Back to his comfort level.

Itachi roiled beneath him, body rolling to the side in a vain, half-hearted attempt at escape, hands pressing against Shisui's chest. He relented to his persistent tongue, mouth opening softly to him. His cock twitched in his hand, legs shaking. And for a moment, Shisui stopped - not out of guilt, but to just _look_ at him, to focus his (bad) eyesight in the dark and just watch him. And the only thought that crossed his mind was how unbearably _cute_ he was, and how excruciatingly painful it was going to be to _not_ have sex with him _now_. But he wasn't. He wasn't going to rush him and psychologically traumatize him, nor was he going to rush him and make him sexually frigid. He shuddered, so wanton, hand moving faster as Itachi's mouth opened and twining his tongue slowly, grinding into him and letting his thumb trace deep circles over the head.

His throat tickled and hummed as Itachi exhaled a moan into his mouth, unwilling, and promptly blushed a deep, swarthy red that drifted as low as his chest, pajama top hanging open, and Shisui _squirmed_, arousal shaking him to the core, hand pumping him faster just to hear him groan like that again and precum soaking his fist, between his fingers. Itachi writhed, seeming unable to control the movements of his limbs as they spasmed. His breath scattered and he couldn't recollect it for all his efforts, hands pressing at his shoulders and his collarbone, breaking from him with a gasp.

"Shi-- mm..."

Shisui's teeth closed around a path of skin just below his right ear, grinding into him thicker, hand moving faster, well aware that Itachi was getting there because his thighs were shaking so hard they seemed completely independent from the rest of him and he was losing his ability to control. Itachi hated loss of control. Itachi, along with every other human on the planet, liked orgasm. This was conditioning at its absolute finest.

Pavlovian. Almost.

Itachi clenched his legs shut in a vain attempt to deter him and Shisui knocked them open again, soliciting a whine from between his lips and making him pulse with red. He kissed him sweepingly, inadvertently thick but never too much, never more dominating than Itachi wanted, never more than he could handle, tightening his fist and pumping him so thick and so fast he knew Itachi couldn't take much more of it.

He quaked, body shaking and eyes aflutter. His whole self felt alight with something akin to a surreal force, like something lifting him up, heating his face and his skin. Something lit upon his mind and he tore his mouth away, fighting him for a bare moment before he came, terribly soft and quiet between them, eyes rolling back into his head. Shisui pumped him through it, until he was absolutely finished before pulling his hand away, sticky wet with semen that he wiped away onto the sheets, watching him with ox eyes. Itachi's entire figure was shaking slowly in a forced silence, lips pressed together and eyes dazedly closed, and Shisui snorted softly, kissing his forehead.

Itachi's skin jumped, but he lay motionless, brain buzzing with shock and white noise.

Shisui pecked his lips, letting go of him entirely and sitting back to exhale. There was a little halo of sweat at his forehead and his arm was sore, which was a bit of a pain because he would have to go back to his room and jerk off if he was ever going to sleep again. He couldn't even imagine sleeping, regardless, and couldn't stop rolling the fluid over between his fingers. Itachi's. He let out a soft sigh and stood up, kissing him again, closed-mouthed and so chaste.

"...goodnight. Cara mia."

xx

Good God this is huge. Yaaaaay porn. I don't even know how we (Lamb and myself) can write so much when most of the time, not a lot is happening. Buttt hopefully the conversation can be used to get a grasp on their relationship man idek? See you next chapter! And btw this was almost completely unbeta'd. If the grammar's off or whatever, don't mention it 'cuz I don't care.


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